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COPYRIGHT DEPOSrr. 



THE INFINITE 

IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

By JOHN E. MOHLER 



" And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son also Himself be 
subject unto Him that put all things under Him, that God may be all and in all." — 1st Cor. 
15:28. 



Los Angeles, California 
1913 



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-^^^ 



Copyright 

1913 

JOHN E. MOHLER 



©C1.A34T715 



PREFACE. 

In many sections of the world there are children of God 
who are looking for the end of the world to come to pass. They 
think they see many prophecies pointing to it. That the great 
majority laugh at them and regard their prophecies as but a 
repetition of like prophecies in previous ages, which have failed, 
does not shake them in their belief. It only strengthens their 
belief, because of what Christ said, foretelling that "As in the 
days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, 
marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah en- 
tered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and 
took them all away; so shall the coming of the Son of man be." 
Matt. 24:38, 39. 

This is not a book upon prophecy, although the author re- 
gards it as leading toward, if not right into, the second coming 
of Christ in ways not expected. But it is a book upon LIVING, 
in which we perceive that all which is spoken in the Bible con- 
cerning things which must come to pass before the end of the 
world, is a general prophecy also of what shall come to pass in 
a figurative way in the life of each individual who comes into 
the best upon earth which God has foretold for him. It is "the 
kingdom of God within you" as Christ says, by which, when we 
enter fully, we shall experience, not long for, "all spiritual bless- 
ings in heavenly places in Christ," as Paul says. We perceive 
that amongst His people everywhere Jehovah is calling many 
upon that higher plane of Godly living which neither individ- 
uals nor assemblies have yet experienced. God's call today is 
to both individuals, and to assemblies representing His spiritual 
Body, to enter this inheritance which is for them. 

The peculiar unrest in the church and in the world will no 
doubt continue until a people have responded to His call. After 
that, who knows what, so great are His ways? Those who are 
reaching out for His greatest heaven in their own lives will 
welcome this book as a gleam of light to make more clear the 
pathway. 



CONTENTS. 



INTRODUCTION. 

"Growing Old Together" — The Angel's Visit — How Heaven 
Reached Earth— Christ More Beautiful — The Book not a Theory, but 
Practical— How it is Sold 9-17 

CHAPTER I. "Thou Shalt Love." 

Why Israel Could not Obey the First Commandment — Why the 
"One Lord" Appears to Man as a Trinity — Obedience in Love First 
on the Day of Pentecost — Why the Pentecostal Baptism is Necessary 
For Us to Love God — Distinction Between The Baptism OF the Holy 
Ghost and The Baptism WITH the Holy Ghost— "Perfect Love" and 
not "Tongues" the Unerring Bible Evidence of the Latter — God a 
Trinity of Self-renunciation 19-37 

CHAPTER II. "Who His Own Self Bare Our Sins." 

When God Shall be "All And In All"— When He Was "All And 
In All" Before the Creation — When the Son was "Begotten of the 
Father" — Why Creation was Impossible Except Through Christ — Why 
None Can Enter Heaven Except Through Christ — Why and When 
Satan First Manifested Himself in Heaven — Satan's Probable First 
Conversation With God — What it Cost God to Cast Him Out of 
Heaven — Man's Creation Impossible Until Satan Was Cast Out — Why 
Man Can not get Away From God — Why the Jews had to Reject 
Christ— The Real Christ Whom They will Accept as Readily as the 
Gentiles— Why They Could not be Won to Christ Before 38-56 

CHAPTER III. "If We Suffer We Shall Also Reign." 

How to Make Heaven's Power Ours — Not in All Lines at Once — 
The Power Perfect in Each "Gift of the Spirit" — ^Each One's Place 
as a "Member" of The "Body" — The Evil of Transgressing Upon 
Another's Member's Sphere — Much "Teaching" Without the "Gift" 
of Teaching a Common Error — The Secret of "Esteeming Others 
Better Than Themselves" — The Necessity of Self-renunciation, and 
What It is 57-69 

CHAPTER IV. "The Life Was The Light Of Men." 

The Seen Christ— His Life Now In Us— The Unseen Christ in 
The Father — His Life In Us Also — The Unseen The Greater— Re- 
vealed by the Holy Ghost — Christ Had No Ecclesiastical Authority — 
Ecclesiastical Authority a Handicap to Living The Perfect Life of 
Christ — Why Ecclesiastical Authority Is Necessary — Bishops, Pastors, 
Deacons, Etc., Are Appointed by the Holy Ghost — Necessity of Those 
in Authority Counselling With Those Without Authority— When 
Authority Over Devils, Disease, Etc. is Perfect— The Difference Be- 
tween Authority Belonging to The Seen and to The Unseen 70-87 



CHAPTER V. The Father's Life. 

Christ in the Father Wholly in The Unseen — From the Father's 
Standpoint All Things Appear Perfect, and "Why — ^When and Why 
Satan Can Not "Touch" Us— The Father's Life In Us One of Over- 
coming Love — Common Errors Which Keep us Out of The Father's 
Life — Why Women Are not at Their Best in Authority — How We 
May Lose the Perfect Use of Any "Gift of the Spirit"— When and 
How We may possess All Things in This Life — When and Why We 
Must Give All Things to Others 88-105 



CHAPTER VI. "And They Shall See His Face." 

Why Our Freedom Purchased by Christ is not Manifest — A 
Greater Christ Than We Have Known — ^A Father Whom Many Are 
Smiting Even in The Name of Christ — The Father's Face Hid Be- 
hind our Imperfections — His Humility Greater Than Men Saw in 
Christ — Our Greater Glory Being Worked out Through Imperfect 
Appearances Now Borne by the Father — The "Scapegoat" — How We 
Form Individuality for Heaven — ^Why, Without Overcoming, We 
Should All be "Like Peas in a Pod" in Heaven— We Can See Only 
the Father's "Hands" and His "Back Parts" Now — How to Get the 
Best Vision of Him— How Christ "Hath Abolished Death". .. .106-128 

CHAPTER VII. "Not By The Sight Of The Eye, Neither The 

Hearing Of The Ear." 

We Have Both Natural And Spiritual Senses — They Relate, 
Respectively, to the Seen and the Unseen — Christ Judged Wholly By 
Spiritual Senses — ^^Spiritual Life Too Fine to be Judged by Natural 
Senses — The Source of all Divisions Amongst Children of God — The 
Conversion of Natural Into Spiritual Senses — ^AU Knowledge Leads 
to Knowing God, if Rightly Received — How to Use the Natural 
Senses to The Highest Joy — "Sensing" God's Life in others, and a 
Caution— God's Highest Not in Others 129-138 



CHAPTER VIII. "Neither Do I Condemn Thee." 

The Natural Senses Lead to Wrong — ^If Many Who Sin Under- 
stood the Spiritual Senses They Would Not Sin— God Knows This 
and Looks Upon the Heart — David, a Man After God's Heart, Un- 
derstood in This Light — ^Why Harlots Were Not Condemned By 
Christ — ^Why and How Such May Become Precious in His Service — 
The First Marriage — The Real Sin of the Flesh — The Israelites Were 
Permitted to Drink Wine at Their Feast — ^When Men Dare Not 
Approach God, and Why — The Church More Anxious to Preserve 
Her Own Reputation Than to Save Souls Deepest in Hell 139-154 



CHAPTER IX. "Nothing Shall Be Impossible To You." 

Adam's Possibilities Had He Obeyed God — ^His Power Restored 
to us Through Christ — How We Lose Spiritual ''Touch" With God, 
as Adam Did — The Symbolical Account of His "Fall" Applicable To 
Us— The Forbidden Fruit to Us— An Exposition of, Is. 4:1— Woman's 



Place of Highest Ministryr-The Call to MEN of GOD— The Place 
Attraction in The Flesh Should Occupy — Man Responsible Not 
Woman — Men Have Not Been Men in the Church as Women Have 
Been Women — Not Woman's Fault That She Rules Man — When and 
Why Marriage Should be Abstained From— Christian Evolution— A 
Home for "Nameless Infants" and for "'Cast Outs" — What They 
Signify Preparatory to Christ's Soon Coming — Christ Coming in Ways 
Not Looked For 155-184 



CHAPTER X. "Not As Man Seeth." 

God's Ways Not Man's Ways— The "Social Feature" in the 
Church a Curse to Advancement — Taught By All Nature — Why There 
is Success in Spite of It— How Self in Christ Was Crucified— When 
We are Crucified After the Same Manner — God's Love and Human 
Different— Woman as Different From Man Spiritually as She is 
Naturally — ^What Both Must do to have the Greatest Possible Happi- 
ness — Woman Man's Leader Naturally — What God Requires of Men — 
The Difference Between the Sexes Traced to Their Creation 185-210 



CHAPTER XI. "Our God Is A Consuming Fire." 

Overcoming Death — Translation — Crucifixion of Self — How God 
Consumes Self in His Love — Health From Heaven Taking the Place 
of Self in Man — God's Love Consumes Disease in Us — Heaven's 
Health Must be Used for Others — Hell a Necessity — ^How All Are 
Saved Through Christ— When "Death and Hell Shall be Cast Into 
the Lake of Fire"— What is "The Lake of Fire"— .What Is the 
"Second Death" — When God's Love and Not Self Interprets "Everlast- 
ing Torment" — God's Love Consuming all Opposition to Him. . .211-233 



CHAPTER XII. "Perfect Love Casteth Out Fear." 

Perfect Love is Perfect God — God Not Divisible — ^When We Have 
God We Have all of Him— Why We Fail to Manifest God— Perfect 
Love is in The Unseen — How God makes Prophets and Workers of 
Miracles — Trying to Make Them of Many Who do not Know it — A 
Spiritual Bugle Call Today as Never Before — The Secret of Power in 
"Two and Two" Uniting — How To Give Freely Like God Gives — Why 
God Can Find His Own Gold— Freely Giving the Secret of Freely 
Receiving 234-260 



CHAPTER XIII. The "Perfect Law Of Liberty." 

The Mosaic Law Began With Adam— Why All Have Not Health 
Who Obey That Law — Many Blessings Can not be Purchased — The 
Purchasing Power of A Life Work — The Mosaic Law a Law of Ex- 
change — How to Receive all the Blessings Promised in the Bible — 
The Law of Love — The "Golden Rule" Not the Best Rule — Christ's 
Diamond Rule Far Better — Why We Feel Persecutions — The Final 
Union of Jew And Gentile Drawing Nigh — A Greater Life Opened 
up to Both— Like a Sea in Expanse — "A Little Child Shall Lead 
Them" Into God's Perfect Love to All People 261-277 



INTRODUCTION. 

"That is the way you and I will be, husband, when 
we grow old together." They were looking at the illus- 
tration of Mr. and Mrs. Clifford, in E. P. Roe's "Na- 
ture's Serial Story." It was a wedding purchase which 
she had made in Philadelphia, "because," she explained 
to her husband, "the character, Web, is just like you, 
only you are much handsomer and better." And it 
pleased him for her to say so, although in his masculine 
heart he had no doubt she was a partial and wholly 
unreliable judge. 

As the days and years passed, the peaceful old couple 
by the fireside — he in the undaunted power and 
strength of well ripened age, his wife an embodi- 
ment of the virtue and solicitude belonging to the 
mother of his stalwart sons — became an ideal which 
was looked forward to in pleasure and confidence by 
the young couple, rather than in the customary dread 
of old age. But it was not to be — in the way they were 
looking for it. In the midst of her prime of mother- 
hood's usefulness the shadows began to close, and the 
hope of "growing old together" with her husband nar- 
rowed itself to the prayer that her children might be 
well grown in youth before she passed into a greater 
but an unseen life. And the Father, in His kindness 
granted it so. 

"It is all right, husband," she would say, as together 
they saw the veil unfolding to finally close about her, 
between them both. What "it" was to which she re- 
ferred was not spoken. There are no words to express, 
on the one hand, the harshness it presented to two who 



10 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

had so apparently been promised, in their hopes, that 
they should "grow old together," and upon the other, 
the tenderness, in glory and freedom and possibilities 
she should enter ahead of him preparatory to his later 
coming. For they knew a kind Father and not a heart- 
less enemy ruled in it all. 

After the AngeFs visit it was not manhood's strength 
which enabled him to concede that it was "all right," 
notwithstanding it made him glad to know she was 
now in the rapture of a freedom unknown to earth. 
In his weakness he had to submit to Heaven's decree. 
And because he was weak and not strong he did not 
have Heaven's joy in the drawing of the veil which 
left him behind, to grow old alone. For hearts do not 
mate in that way but once. 

But God is good. There is compensation for all dis- 
appointments if we can await His time to see it, and 
go with Him through trials which shall brighten our 
vision. For when we see from God's viewpoint all is 
grand and beautiful and perfect. And through trials 
few will not, and many cannot, bear, the husband vol- 
untarily went alone with God. She could never have 
borne them, for woman was never intended to bear a 
man's burden. And had she lived she should have 
grieved inexpressibly not to have shared them with 
him. God's wisdom in taking her now began to ap- 
pear, as he was glad she was spared these greater 
trials. 

And it is but a step between God's wisdom and His 
tenderness and joy. 

This step was taken and the man walked in spirit 
beside his Heavenly Father. 

It was different, then. For the "perfected" Christ 
(Luke 13:32) is in the Father, and He walked with 



TEE INFINITErJN TRINITY AND UNITY 11 

Him, too. And somehow he felt that She was there, 
also, and they walked side by side, at times, as before 
she went. And that because she was with the Father 
she could see with him into things deeper than it is 
permitted a woman upon earth to know by reason of 
the peculiar crucifixion required. And because she 
can not know them they are hid from the man who is 
"one flesh," or natural life, with her. 

And thus w^as there compensation. God was good. 
He now saw from God's viewpoint. And the Father's 
joyous life in the Unseen flowed into the man who still 
walked in the Seen. God showed him that henceforth 
he should help others in ways impossible except along 
the path he had trod. Help men and women who are 
blessed with the privilege of "growing old together" 
as he and she had hoped to do. For, there are things 
which God reveals that can be received only through 
a door opened by the suffering he had borne. 

It is the way of the Father's life and its ministry 
through men. 

It will always be so. God compensates. God is 
good. 

And while the man walked with the Father with 
the living Christ within, he stooped with Him to the 
lowest ones of earth. To the poor, the forsaken, the 
cast outs of the diseased and the feebleminded, the 
drunkards, and the harlots, who are avoided by so 
many of the churches. It is what the Father did in 
Christ, in His earthly ministry. 

As he served them, ministering to their bodily sus- 
tenance and comforts, in order to reach their souls, 
strange things came into his life. Heaven's perfect 
knowledge began to come in with richness and fullness 
such as he had often wished for while in his study, pre- 



12 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

paring "food" for the Chief Shepherd's flock. But it 
had not come then as now. Then he saw the Lord's 
highest delight was not in libraries and desks as he had 
used them. But that wherever one walks in the foot- 
steps of the Master's lowly ministry amongst men 
there is the place to receive richly of Heaven's 
knowledge. 

Then said his brethren with him in this service, 
" 'You go aside. *It is not reason that we (all) should 
leave the word of God and serve tables.' But give 
yourself 'continually to prayer, and to the ministry of 
the Word.'" See Acts 6:2-4. He did as they bade 
him, but not as of old. It was a new study now. A 
study whose pervading spirit was linked hand in hand 
and heart in heart with his brethren and sisters who 
ministered to the needy in body and soul, amidst earth's 
cast out and unfortunate ones. He would not separate 
himself from them. And so his study of printed vol- 
umes became glorified by windows which opened to- 
wards heaven whence there streamed the light of the 
eternal records shelved in the "Study" above, where 
the Father sits with Christ at His Right Hand. 

It was a favored position not often seen in churches. 
Truly we see many ministering to the needy, in "serv- 
ing tables." And we see many who give themselves 
"continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the 
Word." But their lives and spirits are often widely 
separated. The first remain in ignorance of precious 
hidden truths because their eyes must be so much upon 
the Seen. The second remain ignorant of God's deeper 
mysteries in the healing of bleeding hearts and sick 
bodies because, if they knew them, they would not know 
how to apply them as ointment to torn and discouraged 
and neglected lives. But when their ministries are 



THE INFINITE^JN TRINITY AND UNITY 13 

united in one life as in this instance, the Seen with the 
Unseen, Heaven's truths may indeed be made to kiss 
Earth's sorrows, through the light of the former flood- 
ing out the darkness of the latter. 

It is the way of our Christ when He lived in the 
Seen, united with His Father in the Unseen. 

It was the way of His church, in her best and most 
fruitful days following upon the first ''Day of Pente- 
cost" after His departure. 

And when it is our way, even in these "last days" 
why should not truths seared over through the cen- 
turies of dwarfed service and mental wanderings, come 
to light, as in this volume? 

The man was in daily touch with a people who had 
drained the dregs of life, and who were so tired of 
themselves they laid bare their hearts as they would 
do under no other circumstances. This gave him a 
view of hearts of all other persons who would not re- 
veal themselves at any price. For human hearts are 
the same, the world over. And in learning man he 
learned secrets of God because man is created in the 
image of God, and thereby reflects God's nature to 
whoever can see. 

It is difficult, however, to set aside those who shall 
give themselves to prayer and to the ministry of the 
Word, in the spirit of those early disciples. For to the 
flesh there appears exaltation, and God does not reveal 
His humility and hidden depths in exaltation. It is 
difficult to set them aside in the dishonor and cruci- 
fixion of self which God delights to honor by revealing 
His mysteries long hidden from His precious children. 
Herein God worked marvelously. For the servant of 
the Lord entered his place through trials and humbling 
such as men could not foresee, and only God could bring 



14 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

about. It was through trials and self -crucifixion that 
the early disciples were able to receive wondrously of 
their Lord. And it is ever His way. 

That the Father's Hand is in the presentation of the 
truths herewith brought forth need not seem strange. 
For they have a direct bearing upon the fact that great 
spiritual light should appear about the time of the 
restoration of His Firstborn of the Nations, the Jews, 
to His favor. As the signs of their return to the 
Promised Land are appearing the dawn of the greater 
spiritual light is brightening. 

Not of the least in value of what is herein written 
lies in the fact that it is not a theory with merely a 
probable manifestation some time and some where. 
But it is the story of eternal truths being worked out 
in real live, throbbing, ministering human beings, with 
deeds open to their fellows amidst whom they move as 
dynamos of blessings energized from heaven. 

Where the picture drawn is too ideal in the spiritual 
for any to have yet reached, be it known they are 
pressing towards the mark as a prize of their high call- 
ing in Christ Jesus. Not a day or an hour is wasted in 
idle waiting for what is promised. But roses of bless- 
ings are strewn upon the pathway of all men and 
women, in the meantime, and thorns of pain and dis- 
tress are being removed from the feet of the bruised 
and the sore and needy, in all walks of life. While 
they are awaiting the coming of the Bridegroom they 
are honoring His earthly life by making His Highway 
of Coming glorious with His lowly deeds wherever lie 
the needs. 

And why need we speculate and theorize about the 
details of a far distant future, or about that which is 
wholly in the Unseen, until we are able to more per- 



THE INFINITE, JN TRINITY AND UNITY 15 

fectly live the life God is calling us into right now, as 
herein noted? For indeed there are great things im- 
mediately before us, after which, when we enter, we 
may anticipate the reception of rivers of Heaven's light 
and power such as to dispel as black darkness that 
which, in our vain imaginations, we should accept as 
light and wisdom, now. 

"Truly the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep 
things of God." 1 Cor. 2:10. But man is able to 
receive of the Spirit's "deep things" only as he is able 
to practically use them in God's own way of ministry. 
We can not enter the ocean of God's wisdom except we 
are able to use the drops of water which bathe our feet 
upon the brink of that ocean. 

In this book we truly believe nothing is proposed 
which is non-orthodox. If there are new revelations 
of the word they are not "another Gospel" than the one 
which God has so signally owned through the ages. 
The superficial critic may think there is heresy just as 
the doctors of the Jewish Law thought Christ came to 
destroy the law, when, instead. He was but the unfold- 
ment and the fulfilling of their precious law. The writ- 
ings of the apostle Paul would appear to some as a new 
Gospel were it not that a spiritual perception shows 
that they are but the unfolding of the very Christ 
whose life is recorded in the Gospels. 

And so, that which appears new herein may be per- 
ceived in the Spirit to be but the unfolding of that 
written Word whose richness and depth no man has 
been able to fathom and reap. It is "the old, old story" 
in a dress which appears new simply because a little 
fold of the cloak worn by the Christ, the very Living 
Word, through the centuries of mental comprehension, 
has been drawn aside with a reverent hand, disclosing 



16 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY ] 

a few of the jewels adorning His person. That then 
are many, many more jewels not yet seen goes withoui 
saying, to the person whose faith is rich and deep in e 
God who is beautiful beyond all measure and whc; 
desires us to know Him. 

Literary merit is not foremost in this work. The 
author sees faults a-plenty in it, and he is aware thai 
there is repetition of thought and of statement in som( 
portions. They are tolerated with the hope that the 
reader will receive the thought more clearly and readilj 
in its new relation to contexts, if it should have escapee 
him at its first perusal. 

The author acknowledges a deep debt of gratitude 
to the assemblies of ''The Church of the Firstborn' 
who have heard the reading of the chapters one by one 
and have given wise counsel and true inspiration.* 

Also to those whose spirit and power have beei 
realized in the Unseen, as "spirits of just men made 
perfect," one with us. 

The book is dedicated to all persons who have the 
time and inclination to learn more of their own mar- 
velous being and of their Creator's wonderful love 
hidden beneath all that is either dismal or bright ir 
what appears; and to all whose heart beats in unisor 
with the hearts of their fellows the world around 
None can be true to their fellowmen long and not be 
led into oneness with God in His best creed of Love 
through Christ Jesus. 

It is sent forth with the hope that it will fall intc 
the hands of none except those who shall receive i1 
gladly. The uniform price is $1.50. If either the 



♦This has been in assemblies in the Spirit in which eternal principles 
governed, and which ever govern this "church." A folder will be senl 
to those requesting it, in which are unfolded in detail a number of thest 
principles. 



TEE INFINITM^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 17 

money or the time required to read it is given grudg- 
ingly we do not wish to receive either, lest our spirit 
of giving freely should be restricted, as noted in the 
chapter on "Perfect Love." Therefore if the reader 
does not wish to retain the book after receiving and 
reading it he may return it within ten days after re- 
ceiving, in good condition, and we shall return the 
$1.50. If the book is not returned we shall use the 
money to help the poor and to publish more literature 
along this line, as the Lord wills. 

This proposal does not apply when you purchase 
through agents who receive a commission, but when 
your name and address is on our records with your 
order. We shall send you notice from time to time 
when other publications are ready for delivery. A 
volume of "Notes on the New Testament" is already 
prepared for the press and shall appear in the Lord's 
own time, which is perhaps very soon. 

For truly Satan is a humorist, laughing at us in our 
bondage to Him when we have a God who is so able and 
ready to free us when we know and follow Him, even 
as disclosed in this book. And this is but a little of 
the ray of light which will be revealed later as the 
children of the Father grow into "His image from 
glory to glory." J. E. M. 

Los Angeles, Cal., May 3, 1913. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY 

AND UNITY 



CHAPTER L 
"Thou Shalt Love." 

There was a time when God presented Himself to 
His children as "One Lord." Then there came a time 
when He presented Himself as a trinity, or as three 
persons in one Godhead. Matt. 3:16, 17 and 28:19. 
There is coming a time when He shall once more come 
before us as "one Lord." 1 Cor. 15:28. More than 
that, then every one shall receive Him as such, when 
God shall "be all and in all." 

We have not a changeable God, that He should pre- 
sent Himself in different ways, needlessly. Nor is the 
trinity a distinction of so little significance as not to be 
regarded in considering God's unity. For God would 
not have permitted confusion to come into men's minds 
because of it without a justifiable cause. Therefore 
we may reverently ask why this peculiar presentation 
of Himself was necessary. And the answer is found 
in the fact that it was impossible for man to receive 
Him as "one Lord" at first. That is, as God wants to 
be received. This was proved through centuries of 
trial. 

The way God must be received to enter into His 
greatest blessings is described in the following words : 
"Hear, Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord: and 



20 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, 
and with all thy soul, and with all thy might." Deut. 
6:4, 5. 

This command is reasonable. And yet how could 
they love Him thus when they knew so little about Him ? 
Such love comes not by trying, but from knowing. 
They had never seen Him. True, prophets and preach- 
ers told about Him. But they were obliged to warn 
and reproach the people because of their wantonness 
until the love they might have had for Him was dis- 
placed by a greater fear. And while He sent them 
rain and food and sunshine and health, calamities and 
pestilence and famines were also attributed to Him. 
Therefore, in all of the Old Testament writings is it 
any wonder we see little to signify they regarded God 
as a tender Father whom they could possibly love to the 
degree they were commanded? 

And God, seeing this, began to adapt Himself to 
man's comprehension sufficiently that he might love 
Him so. After man had proved to himself his inca- 
pacity to know God sufficiently for such love, God sim- 
plified Himself by approaching man in parts, as it were, 
or as persons of the Godhead. It is the way of all suc- 
cessful teaching of things too great to be received as a 
unit. Therefore we need not be surprised that God 
should use this method. For He was too great to be 
received in His unity as a tender Father for whom we 
should be consumed in love. 

So He approached man in the form of His Son, as 
one of the parts of Himself, so to speak. And yet the 
Son really represented the entire Godhead. Col. 2:9. 
But to man He appeared as a man. The wisdom of 
this is in the fact that man understands man as he 
understands no other being. "As in water face an- 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 21 

swereth to face, so the heart of man to man." Prov. 
27:19. In the ministry of the Son upon earth God 
showed that He felt and wished and served and loved 
in sympathy with man. And He manifested in Christ 
His own power and justice and mercy and love and 
tenderness, and even His servitude to man, as Christ 
became the servant of all men. The cHmax showing 
the melting forbearance of God's nature was reached 
when Christ voluntarily yielded to man's selfishness 
and hatred and permitted man to crucify Him, while 
He forgave him in the very act of his malice. 

Thus it was that, in a few short years God, in this 
simple manner, in the person of His own Son, became 
"the light of men," by which He revealed to them His 
real nature more clearly than they had been able to 
know Him through the centuries. And yet, notwith- 
standing, they did not know Him sufficiently to love 
Him as He required. They admired Him. They mar- 
veled. They covenanted with Him in blood. Matt. 
26 :27, 28. They pledged undying loyalty to Him. Ver. 
35. But it was not love. God wanted love. He knew 
only love for Him and the same love for his fellowmen 
could make man happy. And God's object in all His 
commands is man's happiness. They did not love Him 
sufficiently to give them the joy He had for them. 

They knew and loved their fishing better. Jno. 21 :3. 
They could not become one with Him in every way, for 
even in Christ there was something so inconsistent with 
all human experience they could but wonder. And yet 
God had done all He could to manifest His nature right 
before their eyes. ^'Seeing is believing," and they had 
seen. But seeing is not loving, and they did not love. 

Clearly it was necessary that God should now pre- 
sent Himself to their secret understanding so sim- 



22 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

ply that His loveliness must appeal to them in a way 
that they could love Him to the exclusion of every per- 
son or thing. Therefore before Christ departed from 
the earth He promised that when He went to the Father 
they, together, would send their Holy Spirit to His dis- 
ciples. The Spirit, He assured them, should truly re- 
veal Him who had indeed represented God, but whom 
they had not understood suflficiently to love with all 
their heart, soul and might. And that this same Holy ! 
Spirit should also reveal the Father to them. Jno. i 
15:26 and 16:13-15. 

And this is what God did. It was His final effort to 
come to man as Love which should elicit from him like i 
love in response. For that God loves man with "all 
His heart, soul, and might" was as clearly shown as i 
was possible, in what He suffered for man's salvation, i 
All He desired was the love He had Himself shown. I 

The Holy Spirit was the third person of the Godhead, \ 
completing the trinity. He had indeed been present ) 
when God approached man both as the Father and as 
the Son, but had not been manifested as a separate per- 
son of the trinity except as He was seen in the form of 
a dove upon one brief occasion. Matt. 3:16. He is ; 
the Person which, of the Three, we should naturally 
expect to appeal to man in a way God had not been able 
to reach him before. For He is a Comforter, (Jno. | 
14:16) and never has a man in trouble failed to love a i 
real comforter. And man was in trouble, then. It 
was spiritual trouble. Christ, the light which had ap- 
peared from heaven, and in whom they had rejoiced, j 
had disappeared. John, the light in whom they had | 
rejoiced before seeing Christ, had also gone forever. I 

The darkness was greater because of their having | 
seen the Light. True enough, Christ had breathed the ! 



._J 



THE INFINITMrIN TRINITY AND UNITY 23 

Holy Ghost upon them before His departure (Jno. 
20 :22) and they had doubtless received Him then. But 
not as very God Himself. 

After Christ's departure, when the triune God came 
in all His unity in the person of the Holy Spirit, God's 
children at last knew Him. For He came as a mighty 
Presence with an overwhelming, heavenly comfort 
which lacked absolutely nothing. And did it require 
an effort now to love their God with all their heart, soul, 
and might, as they had been commanded to do so many 
centuries before? No! Their whole beings leaped in 
love to Him as should be expected when the love was 
with all their "might." Never before had this been 
understood, nor manifested. Their very tongues took 
upon themselves strange speech, doubtless the language 
of heaven, so filled with God's love that persons of all 
languages understood them as though "every man 
heard them speak in his own language." Acts. 2:6. 

It was what God had been patiently waiting for 
through many, many generations — ^f or men to love Him 
so. Generation after generation came and passed and 
it had not come. But God continued to love, just the 
same. And at last His heart was made glad. Glad, 
not merely that His love was reciprocated, but that it 
flowed out through the tongues of His children to ex- 
press His love to their fellow men. And not only 
through their tongues, but through their daily lives 
whereby they did God-like deeds and lived God-like 
lives. Nothing but love can do this, because "God is 
love." The fulness of God's love taking possession of 
men works in two ways. Working Godward there is 
the holy joy of praise which penetrates into the under- 
standing of the hardest hearts. And working man- 
ward there is also the giving up of all possessions of 



24 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

self as God has given Himself and all His possessions to 
man. And men are sweetly conscious they are not the 
losers thereby but that they are only enriched the more, 
even as God knows He has enriched Himself by giving 
to others. 

And so the disciples gave up the individual owner- 
ship of property for the need of others, from God's love 
in their hearts. "Neither said any of them that aught 
of the things which he possessed was his own ; but they 
had all things common. And with great power gave 
the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord 
Jesus; and great grace was upon them all." "Inso- 
much that they brought the sick into the streets, and 
laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow 
of Peter passing by might overshadow some of them. 
There came also a multitude out of the cities round 
about unto Jerusalem, bringing sick folks, and them 
which were vexed with unclean spirits ; and they were 
healed every one." Acts. 4 :32, 33 and 5 :15, 16. 

And what was the secret of it all? Merely obedi- 
ence to the command given so long before, "Thou shalt 
love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all 
thy soul, and with all thy might." And what was the 
secret of this obedience ? Not by trying. Not by sac- 
rificing. Not by learning through searching. Job 
11:7. But by receiving God in every secret part of 
one's being through a baptism in the Holy Ghost. This 
had long been promised, and the promise is to all. 
Acts 2:16-21. That is, the promise of the baptism 
to all who will receive. 

Ever since that time man has received God after this 
same manner, before he has been able to love Him with 
all his "Heart, soul, and might." Many have tried to 
love so but have failed. Such love comes not by try- 



TEE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 25 

ing, but by receiving God in His own way, which at 
that time He revealed after every other way had failed. 
Some have tried to love Him thus by receiving Him as 
a whole, or even as Christ or the Father. But except 
God overwhelmed them as a Holy Comforter it has 
been a partial failure, at best. 

Many have had their eyes upon manifestations in- 
stead of upon God. They have been rewarded with 
some manifestations, but so much of self has been in 
the way, as noted in a following chapter, that there 
was not much room for God. They have sought "new 
tongues," and have received them. But they have not 
been tongues of the love of God so penetrating that a 
motley of persons gathered all about them have re- 
ceived the same love in their hearts, whereby the lan- 
guage was understood by all alike. The Holy Spirit 
was not able to interpret it to the understanding of all 
alike because the love of God did not pierce through 
self in all who heard. 

Since that time men have tried to have all things 
common. But except under the baptism in the Holy 
Ghost there was confusion, contention, criticism, im- 
pugning of motives, jealousies, accusations, deprivation 
of needs, self-seeking, etc., etc., instead of all eating 
their food "with gladness and singleness of heart, 
praising God, and having favor with all the people." 

Many have, since then, sought God*s power to heal, 
but except through this mighty baptism the power has 
not come with an irrepressible force as then, "Insomuch 
that they brought forth the sick into the streets, * * * 
that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might 
overshadow some of them." Or that the multitude 
brought from the cities round about "were healed, 
every one." Many revival meetings have been held 



26 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

and much effort expended, but only under the baptism 
in the Holy Spirit have souls been led to God at the rate 
of three thousand per day. Acts 2 :41. 

And why? Not from lack of zeal or learning or 
waiting or working, but from lack of loving Him with 
all their "heart, soul, and might/' And this, because 
it has been impossible to do so except by receiving Him 
in the simplicity of the Comforter in the baptism in the 
Holy Ghost. God has always known that was neces- 
sary in order for man to receive Him according to His 
perfect will. He did not need to try man through ages 
in order to prove it to Himself. He knew but man did 
not know. So God had to prove it to him. 

And, notwithstanding that He did prove it so con- 
clusively comparatively few have yet learned it. For 
they try in the old way of receiving Him as "one Lord" 
according to their respective comprehension. And 
some who do recognize the need of a complete bap- 
tism in the Holy Spirit mistake a partial baptism or 
ecstatic feelings or the speaking in tongues for God's 
completeness. The proof that God has not been re- 
vealed to them so beautifully that they love Him with 
all their "heart, soul, and might" is that they do not 
manifest the Spirit of Christ and the Father in joyfully 
giving up all of self or self's possessions for others, 
grandly conscious they have tapped heaven's inexhau- 
stible mint of blessings. Therefore many who give or 
minister abundantly often do it grudgingly, or at least 
wondering what the outcome will be, instead of giving 
in such love they forget what they gave or to whom 
Matt. 6 :3, to enemies and friends alike, as God does. 
Matt. 5 :44, 45. 

Only God can put such love in their hearts. Or, 
rather, only He can change the heart and so fill it with 



THE INFINITE^^m TRINITY AND UNITY 27 

Himself that no account is taken of limitations in the 
natural. Does He not say so Himself and propose to 
do it ? For He says : 

"And the Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, 
and the heart of thy seed to love the Lord thy God with 
all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest 
live." Deut. 30:6. Is not this what was done upon 
the day of Pentecost? And did they not indeed "live" 
such a life as made their former life, even though one 
of prayer and praise, dead in comparison? And is it 
not a privilege to us, and necessary, as much as to 
them, to have our hearts circumcised, that we might 
"live" in the same way? 

Lest we be misunderstood be it known that all who 
accept Christ receive the gift of eternal life in salva- 
tion, and the gift of the Holy Ghost to lead them into 
all truth. They will be led into all truth as fully and 
rapidly as the flesh or natural man will permit. If 
they continue to hear the voice of the Spirit they will 
be led to see that Christ is a life they shall live in the 
flesh, doing the very things He did. Jno. 20 :21, Rom. 
6 :19. And they will truly love this life more and more 
as the days go by. But it will be largely an intellectual 
joy, reaching indeed, the heart, and it may be retained 
so long as they can keep their minds seeing God in 
what they do. It will not be a spontaneous, irrepres- 
sible joy in sheer living and loving God like a rushing, 
laughing fountain, regardless of what they see or hear 
in people or circumstances to oppose them. Jno. 7 :38. 
Only the baptism in the Holy Spirit as God's simplest 
way of coming into them can give them that. For only 
thus can they know God sufficiently to love Him as He 
says they shall. No one can grow into such love, albeit 



28 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

they may grow into a state of receptiveness for the 
Spirit's baptism. 

This "state of receptiveness" usually follows an in- 
satiable hunger to know God still more, and to express 
the new life within with a freedom impossible in the 
natural man. One should rise upon the highest plane 
one knows, of good will and accord with everyone in all 
the world, and with God. Then, in abandonment of 
self, receive God, as it were, through every pore or part 
of the body, until except for His sustaining grace he 
should lose his life. It was typified in Ex. 40:34, 35, 
relating to our body now as the "temple of the Holy 
Ghost." 1 Cor. 6:19. Self goes out of all thought or 
act, as in the chapter following, when the baptism is 
in its fulness in each instance. And God's will is that 
we shall always remain under the fullest baptism in the 
Spirit which we can receive. When self goes out the 
Holy Spirit must come in. 

Is this mental hallucination? Were it so who could 
say a word against it ? For one's life becomes a bless- 
ing to others and a channel for heaven's mercies to 
reach them unknown except in a baptism in the Holy 
Ghost. But they who have experienced the life say it 
is the only real one. And instead of it being a matter 
of a passing day's experience there is a continued in- 
crease of the beauty of the Holy Spirit's manifestations 
according to one's capacity to grow into receiving Him 
and submitting to His manifold expression of the life 
within. 

The full baptism in the Holy Ghost, in its daily mani- 
festations, has not merely the form of a frenzy or in- 
toxication of spirit which accompanies great religious 
enthusiasm. If it appeared so upon the day of Pente- 
cost one has but to follow the consummation of that 



THE INFINITE^JN TRINITY AND UNITY 29 

experience and see how the disciples settled down to a 
real life of blessing to their fellowmen in joy and minis- 
trations in which self was absent, and how God hon- 
ored them by giving them of His abundance so that not 
any among them lacked. 

Many good Christians are afraid of unusual mani- 
festations under a baptism in the Holy Spirit, lest 
fanaticism should appear. 

Seeking God to the exclusion of everything else, and 
receiving Him, is not fanaticism. For then no good 
thing is excluded. The **one idea" we then follow in- 
cludes all worthy ideas. If what is called fanaticism 
appears under guise of the baptism in the Holy Ghost 
it is from self and not from God. It is no more evil 
than anything in which self is prevalent. It may be 
more obnoxious to our senses because more prominent. 
It is no more obnoxious to God than self in any other 
form. It will not occur if God has His way. 

At the same time we must admit that in perhaps no 
other form of religious zeal is reproach brought upon 
the cause of Christ more quickly than in the behavior 
of many in the midst of any movement looking to a 
great baptism in the Holy Spirit. The flesh directly 
manifests itself in ways that disgusts others, even if 
God does not view it with greater displeasure than He 
does the flesh in a reserve which is the very opposite. 
It is not always the devil in those who look on which 
then makes them speak in opposition to what they see, 
as those who are baptized often think. It is often a 
spirit of misunderstanding. 

For such things are what may naturally be expected. 
When we know that the fulness of the Holy Spirit's 
baptism is really the largest blessing one can possibly 
receive in this life why should not every one who loves 



30 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

God hunger for it? And when one beholds in his 
brother or sister a radiance like unto heaven when the 
Spirit fills them so wonderfully, is it any wonder the 
Spirit of God within him reaches out for the same God 
of heaven? The flesh, not understanding, sets its eye 
upon the blessing. The life of God within the person 
reaches out for more of God, instinctively, as it were, 
while self narrows the efforts of the flesh to what it 
sees. And in self one thinks he is crucifying the flesh 
unto God, when it is only self trying to have its way. 

The result is manifestations which are in the flesh, 
imitating the manifestations in the Spirit so closely 
that the person himself is deceived. Those in the 
Spirit are not deceived. And those children of God 
who have not the perception of the Spirit and who have 
not seen the real manifestations of the Spirit in such 
beauty and power as to be drawn to it, naturally class 
it all as pure fanatacism. Or, not understanding, fear 
the evil of the lower manifestation so much as to feel 
justified in refraining from the entire movement to- 
wards a Pentecostal blessing. 

The facts are that the persons in both cases have 
reached out for God. The one has received Him 
through the Spirit. The other, because self thwarted 
the vision of the Spirit, had only the flesh quickened. 

Therefore, by the very nature of established spirit- 
ual laws of which natural laws are a pattern, we may 
always expect great failures in so high a movement so 
long as there is a promise of great blessings. And in- 
stead of bewailing this fact it behooves those who are 
really baptized with the Holy Ghost to press upward 
in newer and greater triumphs in a radiance and life 
which shall dispel the gloom of failures in the atmos- 



THE INFINITE^N TRINITY AND UNITY 31 

phere of the human. Such love is possible when they 
are clear channels for the beauty and power of heaven 
to descend upon earth as God wills. "Thy will be done 
in earth as it is in heaven," means all of this. 

Although one should receive God with a whole heart, 
it should be with the purpose of permitting Him to use 
one as a channel of ministry of His blessings and love 
to others. To receive for self, or when self is not out 
of His way, is to receive a blessing before one can use 
it aright. Failure results in a large measure, just as 
in the natural one fails when given great honor or 
riches when he is not competent to bear them wise- 
ly. Many of the disciples received the power of the 
Spirit in a miraculous way upon the day of Pente- 
cost, while only a few who had received three years' 
training as they followed Christ continually, were pre- 
pared for a daily ministry in power such as followed. 
The same power is for all who are prepared and who 
receive, even today. 

The subject is simplified when we remember that the 
Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Self-renunciation in love 
for others, as giving one's body to be burned or their 
goods to the poor is a life of self-renunciation for oth- 
ers. When we have a spirit of self-renunciation in 
God's love we have the Holy Spirit, and manifest Him 
as in the thirteenth chapter of first Corinthians. Be- 
cause He is the Spirit of Self-renunciation He can not 
speak of Himself. Jno. 16:13. Nor can He in us. 
But He speaks of Christ. The Holy Spirit is pressing 
all about us to fill us the moment the spirit of self goes 
out of us. 

Self should naturally be eliminated first upon any 
line in which we desire God the most intensely. So the 
first baptism of the Spirit we may experience naturally 



32 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

comes into us upon that line. That is, in which we are 
the soonest free of self. 

For example, if our greatest longing is for God's love 
in service to humanity, the moment we are free of self 
this is the line upon which it is manifested and upon 
which He comes in with a holy quickening and energiz- 
ing of our service, with a joy and power which is not 
of the flesh. If, instead, our greatest longing for God 
is for mere happiness of soul, self will be eliminated 
upon that line first, and we shall therein receive our 
first baptism of the Holy Spirit. Then our greatest 
manifestation of the Spirit will be in shouting praises 
to God. 

Right here is a crucial point in our spiritual life. If 
in either of these experiences we rest content to receive 
God in no other ways our growth becomes restricted, 
and we may even backslide before we are aware of it. 
We see it manifested in both examples. Some lives are 
filled with shouting and praising, but not in ministering 
to the needy. Even wrong doing passes without com- 
punction in the solace taken in the baptism of joy in 
the Spirit. Later, praising gives way to complaining. 

Lives of the other example may be beautiful and com- 
forting in service to their f ellowmen, but there is not 
the glad joy of soul that loses itself in praise. Instead 
there is a spirit of complaint, perhaps, that others are 
so careless as to leave so much service for them to do. 
At last those who serve tire of it all. 

Instead of becoming quieted in our yearning for God 
because of the baptism in the Spirit upon any line we 
should the more eagerly seek Him so wholly that He 
will add graces or gifts of the Spirit until He comes 
in to displace self upon every line of thought or action. 
For His life must grow within us or self overshadows 



TEE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 33 

it. So long as it grows in overcoming self there is no 
backsliding. 

The great majority of Christians have received the 
Holy Spirit much as the disciples received Him when 
Christ ''breathed upon them," as noted. And they **go 
a fishing" in their secular pursuits much as before. 
This is but natural when they know God in but one of 
the persons of the Godhead. Or even in two, when 
they know both the Holy Ghost and Christ. When 
they receive Him in His unity in a baptism such as the 
disciples afterwards received, when God's love was 
manifested as described in the first four chapters of the 
Acts it is different. There was no more fishing for 
them, after that, except for souls. Without that bap- 
tism they could not possibly have had such love for God. 
With the baptism in the Holy Ghost there is even 
greater power for us than they manifested, because 
the world which must be overcome manifests much 
greater power now than it then did. It is more ad- 
vanced in all the sciences and God's hand is surely as 
much superior to its present advancement as He mani- 
fested Himself then. That ''signs and wonders" are 
not needed now, as then, to turn men to God is a decep- 
tion of the adversary to put Christians to sleep until 
the world overtakes and passes them. 

Indeed it already is "high time to awake out of sleep ; 
for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. 
The night is far spent, the day is at hand." Rom. 
13:11, 12. A "day" in which the power of God de- 
scribed farther on should be manifested that the 
world may be confounded. And who shall say that 
even greater power may not be possible? 

We often differ about the baptism of the Holy Ghost 
because men are satisfied to limit God. All agree that 



34 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

the baptism is necessary. But the limit of the mani- 
festations as evidence of the complete baptism com- 
monly ranges all the way from a consciousness of 
God's Presence being over one, to speaking in unknown 
tongues. A very few anticipate a still greater baptism 
which leads one to give up all of his possessions for the 
poor, and to live in such a relation to God that the 
windows of heaven are continually open to him to sup- 
ply him with more and more abundance as he con- 
tinues to minister to them. 

One may experience a difference between a baptism 
of the Holy Ghost in which He is consciously over and 
directing one, and the baptism ''with the Holy Ghost" 
(Acts 1 :5), which is Emmanuel, or God with us, in the 
flesh. For the Holy Ghost represents the Trinity then, 
and merely uses our flesh as a channel to appear to the 
world. In a full baptism "with the Holy Ghost" the 
power will be manifest of healing the sick by the laying 
on of hands, casting out devils, immunity from a poi- 
sonous drink, speaking in new tongues (Mark 16:17, 
18), and raising the dead. Matt. 10:8. For God can 
do these things through any channel He chooses, and 
He has chosen us to be such a channel. Luke 24:49. 
How to retain and use in perfection any special one or 
more of these powers referred to in 1 Cor. 12, as "gifts 
of the Spirit," in our daily ministry, is described in 
chapter three, and the commonest ways of losing a 
"gift," or curtailing its perfect manifestation, in chap- 
ter five. 

If, instead of seeking to receive God until certain 
manifestations gave evidence to us of the Spirit's per- 
fect work, we became hungry for God to manifest Him- 
self as Emmanuel through us, to the entire exclusion of 
self, it is possible that we should by and by be used of 



THE INFINITE IN TRINITY AND UNITY 35 

Him in joy and power which includes and far surpasses 
the manifestations we had so eagerly anticipated as the 
fullness desired. As truly as the natural world is in 
an age of advancement far in advance of the day of 
Pentecost when the first great baptism was poured out 
upon men and women, may we not know that God is 
ready to show Himself in demonstrations not only as 
great as then, but far greater, that the greater material 
world of today may be confounded from end to end? 
And any anticipations we may have as to what is His 
greatest work through us both hinders our reaching 
that experience and the greater which is in His 
mind. For it is self which anticipates, and it is self 
which must be out for God to be in every part of us, in 
His mighty love. To love God with all of one^s might 
is to obey His voice when He speaks the naturally im- 
possible or unreasonable, as spontaneously and unre- 
servedly as water in a fountain bursts from its con- 
fines in the laughter and abandonment of freedom. 

Thus do we see the absolute necessity of our "one 
Lord" presenting Himself to man in the three persons 
of the Holy Trinity, one after the other. And of the 
Holy Ghost coming into our lives not only as a Com- 
forter or Guide as one of the members of the trinity, 
but also in consciously filling us with the entire God- 
head in order that we may love as He loves us. 

When we come to that place that we see it is abso- 
lutely necessary for us to have this fulness in order to 
accomplish the work God has assigned us we may 
expect to experience it. When we seek the experience 
because we desire a blessing we may fail. It was to 
enable the disciples to ''witness" to Christ's resurrec- 
tion with a power they did not have, and which they 



36 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

knew they must have in their own helplessness, that 
the first great Pentecostal Baptism was received. 

When a full baptism is received, be it early or late, 
one is enabled to love God and one's fellow man, even 
as He loved us. Be it known, however, that the infill- 
ing of the Holy Ghost in this way is not once for all. 
One is always different thereafter, it is true, but the 
baptism is a way of God coming into us, which must 
be repeated over and over with greater and still greater 
power as we learn to know God more. For we may be 
baptized in the Holy Ghost and know very little of Him 
compared to what we may know later. 'This is life 
eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, 
and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent.'' Jno. 17:3. 

As eternal life in us grows the Holy Spirit reveals 
the Father's life in us. It is the life Christ has now 
entered, whence His ''greater works" proceed. Jno. 
14 :12. It is a life of greater humility than the outward 
life of Christ in the flesh. Notwithstanding, under 
the baptism in the Holy Spirit we press determinedly 
into a personal knowledge of the Father, regardless of 
the cost to the flesh. For we love Him. 

We therefore see that our "One Lord" in trinity is 
a worshipful Being of absolute Self-renunciation for 
love of His creatures. 

That is, the Father is His life in the wholly Unseen, 
in such complete renunciation of Himself that none 
of His creatures may see Him through the ages until 
they have become perfected. Ex. 33:20. Rev. 22:4. 
And Christ, the Son, is the appearance of this same 
life in the Seen, "manifest in the flesh," "the Light of 
men," as a Life of Self-renunciation. And the Holy 
Spirit, the same Life in the form of "the Comforter" 
of each child of God, is the Spirit of Self-renunciation, 



THE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 37 

displacing the spirit of self wherein all fear and unrest 
lies. This Spirit, receiving our attention, tells us what 
He hears (Jno. 16:13) of the Father and Son^ for both 
our present life in the flesh, and regarding "things 
to come" in the Unseen. Simple faith is to renounce 
the spirit of self and follow Him in all He speaks. 
When we wholly respond to the Holy Spirit the triune 
God is at once manifested in us in His perfect love and 
power. 

In order for this to be it is necessary, first, for the 
unseen Spirit of the Father in us to reach out to the 
great Father in the Unseen, in the cry, **Abba Father." 
Mark 14:36. Rom. 8:15. Then when the Holy Spirit 
of self-renunciation possesses us completely He will 
readily move the body, or temple in which we dwell, 
just as He moved Christ's temple of His body to do His 
works of love and power in a visible earthly ministry. 
He shall lead us to live Christ in the Seen before we 
can know the Father in the Unseen. For there is first 
the natural and after that the spiritual. 1 Cor. 15 :46. 
Thus it is that the Spirit "shall bear witness," not 
merely in word, but in deed, that Christ and the Father 
are in us of a truth, leading us into "all truth." This is 
regarding future things, as well as into the hearts of 
men and women in the present, as Christ "knew all 
men." Jno. 2:24. Hence the necessity of self-renun- 
ciation, as the following chapters bring forth. 



CHAPTER II. 
"Who His Own Self Bare Our Sins" 

And what about the unity at the last, when Christ 
"shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even 
the Father ; when He shall have put down all rule and 
all authority and power." "Then shall the Son also 
be subject unto Him, . . . that God may be all 
and in all?" 1 Cor. 15:24, 28. It is the word of the 
Lord. In order to apprehend the way of it we must 
consider God's unity before anything was created. 

Then there was absolute unity. Then God was truly 
"all and in all." If not, what and who was there, and 
who created it? If a single thing but God existed at 
that time, a power as great as God created that thing. 
And if our God is the greatest Being who is or has 
been, as we hold, such a power could not have existed. 
This is not speculative thought, but an axiom that we 
must accept if we would have any profit in thought. 

God was alone, then, in His unity. We may, with 
reverence, conceive of Him communing in His own 
Holy Spirit, thus: "I want others with me whom I 
can love and bless." For we are taught that "God is 
love." 1 Jno. 4:8. And who was the person with 
whom He communed? The common inference is that 
it was His own beloved Son, referred to in Gen. 1 :26, 
when He said, "Let us make man," etc. But the period 
we are considering is before this. 

It is before the creation had begun. Even before 
the Son, as He has been revealed to us, had been "be- 
gotten of the Father." Jno. 1:14. We do not say it 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 39 

was before the Son existed, for He doubtless was co- 
existent with the Father. Indeed, after He had ap- 
peared to men John referred to Him as "the only be- 
gotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father." Verse 
18. If He was then so closely related to the Father, 
surely before He was "begotten of the Father" as the 
Son He was not less closely related. 

And when, at that time, we conceive of God in His 
own unity, which was as perfect as it shall be in the 
end, when He shall be "all and in all," we do no vio- 
lence to that unity by considering that the one with 
whom the Father then communed, was His own Self. 
And in our finite comprehension we may consider the 
Father's Self then as synonymous with His Son whom 
we have, later, learned to know as a separate person- 
ality. For there is nothing inconsistent with self and 
sonship being considered synonymously, even in the 
natural, for practical illustration. 

That is, never was son conceived but that he repre- 
sented the father's self. Never a father's self so com- 
pletely represented as in sonship. Were the father's 
love and oneness with his son as perfectly manifested 
throughout life as it is a fact in the beginning, every 
son would be "the express image" of the father's per- 
son. Every one would know the son who knew the 
father, and the father who knew the son. The name 
"son" would express the same as "self." 

When we who are God's children understand our- 
selves in this light, and draw the likeness between us 
and God, we may know Him more simply, because we 
are created in the image and likeness of God. When 
we fail to know relations in God through knowing rela- 
tions in ourselves our eyes are blind to the simplest 
way of learning about Him. 



40 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

Furthermore, this oneness of a son with his father's 
self, illustrated in the natural, was an actual fact when 
Christ appeared to men as the Son of God. He repre- 
sented the Father's self so perfectly that Christ Him- 
self said, "he that hath seen me hath seen the Father." 
Jno. 14:9. If Christ then represented the Father's 
Self so perfectly we do no violence, as said, to God's 
unity in the beginning, prior to the creation, if we con- 
ceive of Him communing with Himself. This once 
granted, we see all scripture concerning heaven and 
salvation cluster so beautifully about it as a basis of 
truth that the way of faith is far more simple and the 
path more clear. We may imagine Him continuing : 

**If I create other beings or things it will destroy 
my perfect unity with Self. For I have nothing of 
which to create them except Myself." (If, as many 
say, God created the world out of nothing, who, pray, 
created "nothing"?) "I must therefore give up or re- 
nounce Self in order to create beings or things which I 
may love." So the Father's Self agreed to renuncia- 
tion, and God began His creation. 

At that very moment His Son meant something dif- 
ferent to us than He meant before, though of course 
we knew it not. At once there was "His own purpose 
and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before 
the world began." 2 Tim. 1 :9. How this grace was 
given to us is revealed in the scripture which refers 
to Christ as "the Lamb slain from the foundation of 
the world." Rev. 13:8. This means more than a life 
of suffering in the flesh. More than a manifestation 
to enlist our sympathy and response in love. More 
than merely a Son sent from heaven to endure earth, 
and the mockery of men. What Christ, the Son, means 
to us is God's renunciation of Himself for our creation 
and salvation. 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 41 

For God had to renounce Self in His own unity in 
order to create anything. That is, He had to let loose 
of Self, of which He created other things, and regard 
fhem as having no hold upon Him. As long as He re- 
tained His own perfect unity He could not create a 
thing, for there was nothing but Himself, as said, with 
which to create. 

When Self agreed to this renunciation then it is that 
we may suppose the Son was * 'begotten of the Father." 
That is. He agreed to be separated from His Father 
so far as He had any claims upon Him more than 
others who should be created in their image. Christ 
was not ^'created" as other beings and things were. 
He was **the only begotten." As such He represented 
the Father's Self, renounced, whereby He created all 
things. Therefore, whatever relation we may think of 
Him as sustaining to the Father, to us and to all cre- 
ation He truly means the Father's Self-renunciation. 
Hence it is the scripture says so simply : 

"All things were made by Him; and without Him 
was not anything made that was made." Jno. 1 :3. 
That is, God made all things by means of Self-renuncia- 
tion, represented by Christ. How could it be other- 
wise? We know truly that Christ was the perfect per- 
sonification of Self-renunciation. He appeared so upon 
earth, but this renunciation did not begin then. It was 
only "manifested" then. 1 Tim. 3:16. It began with 
the creation, when "the Lamb was slain." 

If we do not readily grasp how creation absolutely 
required God's renunciation of His own Self we may 
find it illustrated in our own experience. No one can 
make a thing without self-renunciation. He must put 
himself into what he makes, enough, at least, to accom- 
plish his purpose. The boy yields himself to the mak- 



42 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

ing of a top. The man puts himself into the home 
which he creates. Self must therefore be renounced 
or given up, in a measure, to make anything. 

Therefore when God decided to create things it had 
to be through Self-renunciation. And because He is 
perfect it was beneath Him to think of creating any- 
thing but what should become perfect. And because 
He would create a perfect work His renunciation of 
Self should be perfect. Is not this what was mani- 
fested in Christ? 

In considering God*s renunciation of Self in this 
light, let not renunciation be confused with denuncia- 
tion. The latter is to condemn as wrong, and God did 
not do that of Himself. The former is to consider Self 
as a personality as though it has no claims upon one, 
because of this relation. And it was this attitude the 
Father seems to have assumed towards His Son, and 
therefore towards Himself. For He permitted Him 
to suffer all the trials of the flesh while upon earth just 
as He would permit any being to suffer them. He an- 
swered His prayers just as He would anyone's prayers 
under similar faith, at that time. He permitted Him 
to suffer despair in His death just as any person might 
have suffered. And although the Father went into the 
depths of hell with Christ before He would forsake 
Him (Acts 2 :27) , He will do the same for any one who 
is true to Him. And Christ was true. Heb. 5 :7. 

In order that we may appreciate God's Self-renuncia- 
tion for our sakes we must know how completely He 
renounced Himself through Christ's life in the flesh. 
First, it required His Self-renunciation to condescend 
to take up His dwelling in the flesh of rebellious sub- 
jects. Then to become man's servant. And to yield 
His position of ruler over man by reason of His su- 



THE INFINITEriN TRINITY AND UNITY 43 

perior greatness as man's Creator, and permit man to 
rule over Him, as He * 'became obedient unto death, 
even the death of the cross." Phil. 2 :8. And such a 
death ! Crucified between two criminals, as the chief- 
est of the three ! 

And all along the way, following His baptism in 
water. He had experienced temptation to live for Self 
in all ''points" or callings "like as we are, yet without 
sin." Heb. 4:15. That is, without yielding to Self, 
which would have been a backward step, once the cre- 
ation was begun. That it was hard, was illustrated 
in the fact that the human self which bound Him rose 
up against the sacrifice until the very last. Those 
whom He had denounced and rebuked and was angered 
with (Mark 3 :5. Luke 11 :39-54) He at the last cried 
unto the Father in behalf of, "Father forgive them, 
for they know not what they do." Luke 23:34. For 
this prayer was for all who had ever sinned against 
Him. He manifested the crying of His human self 
when He prayed the Father if possible to remove the 
cup of suffering from Him. He anticipated the battle 
with His human self overcome when He said, "the 
third day I shall be perfected." Luke 13 :32. 

All of this renunciation of Self in the flesh was nec- 
essary for the salvation of man, or his union with God. 
For in man it does require the renunciation of self to 
permit his union with God. Self would separate or 
break union. And God led the way to this union by 
His own Self-renunciation in the flesh, through Christ. 

Since then it has been different with men. For the 
way was opened for all to become consciously the "sons 
of God." And it is through the way He led. That is, 
through self-renunciation. There is absolutely no 
other way to become one with Him or to enter heaven. 



44 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

Calling upon the name of Christ will not avail unless 
it is coupled with a spirit of self-renunciation. Indeed 
it was at the close of referring to Christ's suffering at 
the hands of men that Peter cried out, ''there is none 
other name under heaven given among men, whereby 
we must be saved/' Acts 4 :12. ''Must" is used rather 
than "may," because self-renunciation is inseparable 
from Christ or heaven. His "name" represents self- 
renunciation in love for us, throughout. Renunciation 
in love for the salvation of others represents His name. 
His name is meaningless to us with a shadow of any- 
thing different. And none but He ever renounced Self 
in all ways possible to all human nature. Only one 
real Christ has ever appeared. 

Heaven shall be made up of self-renunciation, hence 
none can possibly enter there who do not renounce self. 
The least self in any would produce discord. There is 
a place for all who renounce self from love to God or 
because of Him. Such can not produce discord. "He 
that believeth on me hath everlasting life," says Christ. 
But he who does not know Christ as a life of self-renun- 
ciation knows not enough to rightly believe upon Him. 
"He that believeth not is condemned already." Jno. 
3:19. The "many wonderful works" in the name of 
Christ predicted in Matt. 7 :22, were not done in self- 
renunciation, but in self-glorification. 

And what is the result when our lives are a mixture 
of selfishness and self-renunciation, as most of them 
are? Paul answers this very clearly in 1 Cor. 3 : 11-1 5. 
God discerns between the selfish and the self -renounced 
life in each person and He will separate them before 
we enter heaven. The selfish life consists of works 
which are "wood, hay, stubble," etc., and these shall 
be "burned" out of us. Those which stand the test are 



THE INFINITE^N TRINITY AND UNITY 45 

the works which are free of self in the love of God, and 
they will be ''saved, yet so as by fire." And if one is 
ignorant of the life of Christ, but renounces self from 
the spirit of God in him, he will no doubt find a place 
prepared for him in heaven. See Rom. 2 :14, 15. 

Is it not thus true that the world will be destroyed 
by fire (symbolical if not literal) , before a ''new heaven 
and a new earth appears?" Rev. 21 :1. It is the com- 
plete destruction of self wherever it appears. For self 
is of the world, always. And the world is for self. 
Everything which lives for self must finally be burned 
as by fire. Our God is a consuming fire in whom self 
can find no place. Nor can it find a place in His 
heaven. Truly a fire to destroy self from entering 
there is an absolute necessity. For everything which 
lives for self must be destroyed before God can pos- 
sibly be "all and in all." 

Even that nature in human beings which is destined 
for self-preservation and for perpetuation of self must 
be destroyed. It is what caused death in the begin- 
ning — reason in behalf of self. Only that which lives 
for others from love to God shall endure forever. It 
is true of all life in heaven. Even flowers which live 
and bloom for self -perpetuation of species will have no 
place there. Only they which bloom for others, after 
the manner of the growth of the "tree of life," whose 
leaves are "for the healing of the nations," may be 
found. Rev. 22 :2. 

And so it is of every created thing. It is in order to 
be made free of self that "the whole creation groaneth 
and travaileth in pain together until now." Rom. 8 :22. 

When all of God's children have renounced self after 
this manner, and all of self in persons and things have 
been destroyed, then Christ "shall have put down all 



46 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

rule and all authority and power.'* Then, instead of 
authority to hold things together there will be perfect 
unity. Then it is that the church, the body of Christ, 
will have become perfected, "without spot or wrinkle, 
or any such thing.'* Eph. 5 :27. Unity will draw the 
children of God as one in Him without the semblance 
of authority which is now necessary. For authority 
will be necessary until all have renounced self. When 
perfected the church will have no self in her midst to 
withstand unity. Then all will be drawn together and 
to God as iron to the magnet. 

At that time the Son will have completed the trust 
committed to Him, of judgment and authority through 
His word. But God will not be as before the beginning 
of creation. There was only Himself to love then. Now 
there shall be countless beings for Him to love. 

And what place does Satan occupy in all of the 
drama of life culminating in heaven? The considera- 
tion of this takes us back again to the beginning. What 
we shall say is not in the spirit of speculative theory as 
to what or who Satan is any more than we should the- 
orize about God as a being for the sake of theory. But 
for a practical understanding of his ways of approach, 
and how to resist him and to receive God instead, self 
is the basis of a simplicity which is very wonderful 
indeed, and helpful. Thus it is, that much which we 
know of God and His ways are learned from a knowl- 
edge of ourselves, who are made in "the image of God." 

Knowledge of this kind is revealed to us through the 
Spirit of God and not the spirit of man. For in the 
discerning of these things "we have received, not the 
spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God ; that 
we might know the things that are freely given to us 
of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words 



THE INFINITE^N TRINITY AND UNITY 47 

which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy 
Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spir- 
itual/' 1 Cor. 2:12, 13. 

So, when God, in counsel with Self, determined to 
renounce Self in order to create other beings, there 
immediately sprang up opposition to it, notwithstand- 
ing Self acquiesced. We may imagine the opposition 
after this order: 

"Let well enough alone. Why suffer all that shall 
come upon you ? You are absolute King, now, of every- 
thing. There is nothing that can ever oppose you. To 
create anything requires your renunciation of Self in 
some way, and then to yield yourself as a servant to 
your creation, obeying their whims, until you can be- 
come absolute King again as now." 

It is not difficult for any person to recognize this 
character. To whom has he not talked in precisely the 
same way, when a great sacrifice for the sole good of 
others was in the counsel of the mind? Or when an 
advance requiring self-renunciation was under con- 
templation ? Christ called him by name when he began 
to oppose him through Peter, and said, ''Get thee be- 
hind me, Satan: for thou savorest not the things that 
be of God, but the things that be of men." Mark 8 :33. 
That is, not the things that require self-renunciation, 
but the things of self. And it is always his way. 

This was undoubtedly Satan's origin, so far as it 
may appear to us. He would surely appear at that mo- 
ment as an adversary. And until then there was no 
occasion for his opposition. That he was an angel once 
occupying a high place in God's councils is symbolically 
if not literally true, and beautifully consistent with this 
origin. Or, rather, with the origin of his fall. For 
when God decided against him he "fell" from his high 
position. 



48 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

No doubt before this he occupied the highest posi- 
tion which existed, next to the Son in the bosom of 
the Father. He was the highest counsellor in heaven 
except the Son, having his throne in Reason, which is 
his favorite seat now in the minds of men. Then God's 
own mind was heaven. That is, the only heaven which 
then existed. We do not disallow the ordinary con- 
ception of heaven. We are only speaking of the begin- 
ning — the type of things thereafter. 

And as Satan sat there he reasoned against God's 
renunciation of Self. True enough, his reasoning was 
in favor of God's Self, as, in man, it is in favor of self 
to this day. His was not the highest reasoning, be- 
cause he reasoned for Self alone and not for others. Is 
it not always his way ? Do we not recognize him read- 
ily, and his seat in God's heaven? Is not the distinc- 
tion clear between his reasoning and God's? 

He advocated self-satisfied pride and opposed humil- 
ity. Standing still in selfishness instead of advancing 
in the renunciation of Self. Anything, anything but 
self-renunciation. But God's love for others overcame. 
He heard every argument of the adversary against it. 
He counted all it should cost Him to create. The renun- 
ciation of Himself in the person of His only begotten 
Son. The humility, the contempt by His creatures, 
their arrogance, and His own vileness in their sight. 
Not for a few years upon earth, but for ages, until He 
should come into His unity once more. Not merely 
the humility represented in Christ upon the cross, but 
a humihty deeper than a visible life could possibly 
represent. 

No doubt Satan brought it all before Him just as, 
later, he showed Christ the kingdoms of this world. 
And as then, he promised Christ quietness and peace 



THE INFINITKriN TRINITY AND UNITY 49 

if He would give up His Messiahship, so he assured 
God that He need bear none of these things if He only 
should remain wrapped up in His own Self. But God 
could not be tempted. Jas. 1 :13. 

He heard it all, but because of His great, wonderful 
heart bursting to bless others we have the precious 
message, 'Tor God so loved the world that He gave 
His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in 
Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Jno. 
3:16. Is it not marvelous? Is it not sweet that He 
loved us so ? And need we fear the power of the adver- 
sary to now separate us from God when we have known 
the seal of His love in our hearts? No wonder Paul 
exclaims, *'I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, 
nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things 
present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor 
any other creature, shall be able to separate us from 
the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.'* 
Rom. 8:38, 39. For it is God's love which renounced 
Self in Christ Jesus for our sakes. 

God's love for our existence and salvation was such 
that He renounced Himself through the ages for us. 
When we remember this we see how impossible it is 
for us to get away from Him. The harder we try and 
the meaner we turn against Him the more He re- 
nounces Himself. That is, the farther He sinks from 
our sight in His meekness and suffering until He wins 
us back. Can we possibly withstand such a God ? 

And how may we return to Him? Simply by de- 
throning Satan from his high seat in the councils of 
our mind, just as God cast him from his high seat in 
heaven before He created us. For it is when we permit 
Satan in the councils of our mind that we draw from 
God. That is the secret of all departure from God. 



50 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

Satan reasons in behalf of self. And he is so subtle 
that when we think self is both renounced and crucified 
he enters our reason in favor of self, be it even a de- 
nounced self. But God renounces Self and reasons in 
behalf of others. That is the difference, always, and 
by that token may we discern him. 

God cast Satan out of His heaven because he plead 
for Self when God decided there was no place for Self 
there. He shall be bound forever and cast out of the 
earth when self has been renounced here and crucified, 
and God*s final unity appears in a "new heaven and a 
new earth." For there will be no place for him. 

In the meantime each of us have our own little 
heaven in miniature, as it were. It consists of life 
when self has been renounced in the spirit of Christ. 
But this heaven is so new to us, and so little do we know 
of it, that Satan will often deceive us and enter the 
councils of our mind before we are aware of it. He will 
seek the highest seat there. And his counsel will be 
the highest and holiest we ever listened to, we some- 
times may think. 

But he may be known by the one "ear mark." He 
reasons in behalf of self, cover it up as skillfully as he 
may. And if we would have our little heaven free we 
shall cast him out. For there is no perfect heaven 
where self has not been renounced. It is only when our 
renounced self has been crucified and destroyed that 
Satan can not enter. And so we read, "He that hath 
suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin." 1 Pet. 4 :1. 

The necessity of God's self-renunciation in the per- 
son of Jesus Christ is referred to in Luke 24:26, 46. 
Acts 17:3. For truly "Christ must needs have suf- 
fered, and risen again from the dead." Failure to see 
the spiritual law of creation absolutely requiring self- 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 51 

renunciation is responsible largely for the attitude of 
the Gentiles towards the Israelites, and their attitude, 
partly because of it, towards the Christ. For it is 
Christ's personality many of them despise and it is His 
personality often thrust the most prominently before 
them as in accusation. Instead, let all of this be lost 
sight of in the great and consistent fact that God had 
to come to earth in just that obscure way, and at just 
the time when the very people whom He had chosen 
were in a state to reject and crucify Him. 

For only thus was self-renunciation and crucifixion 
possible in order that God might give Himself up 
wholly for us. There was not a shadow of suffering 
too much to "finish" (Jno. 19:30) our redemption. 
Anything less would have kept Him back from some 
suffering men endure. Had not the ''chosen people," 
the ''apple of His eye," rejected Him as they did He 
would have lacked in suffering. He would not have 
known a parent's pangs when their heart's treasure of 
a son or daughter turns against them. And had He not 
suffered crucifixion as the most ignominious death He 
could die He would still have to go through it to experi- 
ence the self-renunciation necessary in Christ. The 
Messiah to the Jews could not have come in any other 
way. The Gentiles could have received salvation by no 
other means. Rom. 11:11. 

When we see this shall we longer censure them? 
And when they see it shall they not accept the Christ 
who has come, seeing that if the looked-for Messiah 
should yet come He would have to be rejected in that 
very way? It is all wrapped up in the necessity of 
renunciation of Himself in order for God to make a 
heaven for any of us. And we must both alike enter 
there through the Spirit God manifested in Christ. 



52 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

God did not cease to believe in man, selfish as he is. 
Man must believe in God, in His Self-renunciation. 
This common belief, each in the other, is the basis of 
union, and therefore of man's salvation. 

And why have not both Gentile and Jew seen God 
in this Hght of Self-renunciation, before? For it truly 
is the only basis of union in Christ as it is the only 
basis of heaven. We are either groping in confusion 
or playing in our religion when we disregard it. 

As regarding the Jews, we have not known, simply 
because God's time was not here. It was a "night" 
wherein no man could *Vork" to bring it to light. It 
is now different. The dawn is fast breaking. Its signs 
are in the returning of Israel to Palestine. God is lit- 
erally shaking the world to bring this to pass. That 
is what means the religious fervor widespread, looking 
for Christ's second coming. It is a great epoch in 
religious history. For God's firstborn of the nations 
is about to come into His special favor again. And we 
may expect great spiritual light regarding God to ap- 
pear near at such a time. 

It is the way of our God. When He gave the law to 
Israel it was a light as the world had never seen. When 
''the law of liberty" was revealed in Christ at the com- 
ing of the Gentiles into His favor the light was as far 
ahead of the letter of the law as the law had been in 
advance of the heathen world. And when the Father's 
eldest son in the Jews, having turned prodigal as it 
were, returns to the Father and with joy is received by 
the younger there will be rejoicing to make Heaven 
glad that there is an earth where such things are. 

And with this rejoicing will come spiritual light 
above anything we have known. We shall learn the 
blessed Father as we have never known Him, as noted 



THE INFINim, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 53 

in following chapters. We shall learn still more of 
Him through His firstborn, the Jews. We shall honor 
them as His first-chosen people. We shall hear the 
words of the Father with great spiritual signifi- 
cance say to us, as before, to them, concerning us, 
*'Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him ; and put 
a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet: and bring 
hither the fatted calf, and kill it ; and let us eat, and be 
merry: for this my son was dead, and is alive again; 
he was lost, and is found.'* Luke 15 :22-24. 

It is only when Christ's personality, so precious to 
Gentiles and so obnoxious to Jews, is received in the 
overwhelming glory of God necessarily manifesting 
Himself in that very way that all prejudices may be 
banished. God has renounced Self for us that there 
may be a heaven for many. We shall renounce self 
for Him that this heaven may be ours. 

Are there those who fear we make so much of self- 
renunciation as to overshadow the personality of Christ 
and finally lose sight of Him altogether? A moment's 
reflection will show that we present nothing in that 
way stronger than God's word in 1 Cor. 15:28, "then 
shall the Son also be subject unto Him, . . . that 
God may be all and in all." 

But when we see the blood of Christ shed for us, and 
the life which it represented, as an embodiment of Self- 
renunciation for both our creation and salvation, Christ 
shall never cease to be most precious to our conscious- 
ness. We shall love Him forever in this very person- 
ality. For we shall live eternally in the blessed renun- 
ciation of self which only He has led us into. We shall 
know that we owe Heaven's happiness as well as 
Heaven's preparation for us to that. For it is Christ 
who said, 



54 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

"I go and prepare a place for you, . . . that 
where I am, there ye may be also." Jno. 14 :3. And if 
we call that "place" the place of self-renunciation are 
we making too much of the latter? Is it not the only 
way to begin to experience "all spiritual blessings in 
heavenly places in Christ" (Eph. 1:3) even now? 

Not that I would mean that here is the only heaven 
we may have, or as great as we may have when self is 
crucified. For the perfect heaven requires the cruci- 
fixion of self after it has been renounced, and few if any 
can bear complete crucifixion and live upon earth. 
True, Christ bore it for us, but it requires great cruci- 
fixion of self to receive His life in such triumph. And 
if we cannot bear it here, when we go hence we have 
confidence that our God who is so tender as to then 
"wipe away all tears from their eyes" (Rev. 21 :4) , 
will also consume the self we long to be freed from and 
which we have renounced, in the tenderness and love of 
His own Presence. There is no purgatory and no tor- 
ment of hell for those who have renounced self, but 
have been unable to bear the necessary crucifixion for 
freedom while in the flesh. "Our God is a consuming 
fire" for such. And He is kind and tender beyond 
mortals. 

Another reason why Christ shall be more precious to 
us then by reason of our seeing His personality in the 
light of Self-renunciation, is that we now have but a 
passing glimpse of what our redemption has cost God 
in Self-renunciation, through Christ. His suffering in 
the flesh gives us this glimpse. The depths of it can 
not be shown. It is doubtful if we shall ever know the 
cost. But we shall contemplate it and have it revealed 
more and more by the Holy Spirit as we live in eter- 
nity. And surely the more that is revealed to us the 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 55 

more we shall be able to love Him who gave Himself 
for us. It is this which shall keep the praise of our lips 
going up to Him forever and ever with a living joy as 
of a newly found treasure. See Rev. 5 :9-14. 

It is doubtful if many of us have seen the importance 
of self-renunciation in God's service. It is self which 
hinders perfect obedience to Him. It is self which 
causes concern or anxiety. God is not anxious. It is 
self which permits ill health in our bodies. Ill health 
is not in God. It is self which can not move mountains. 
God can. It is self which doubts. It is self which 
walks by sight. God walks by faith, "and calleth those 
things which be not as though they were" (Rom. 4 :17) , 
and hath chosen "things which are not, to bring to 
nought things that are." 1 Cor. 1 :28. It is self which 
seeks her own. "Love seeketh not her own." Self 
enjoys prominence and authority. God does not. It 
is self which requires sleep and food. God does not. 
It is self which can not pass through closed doors. God 
can. It is self which must ask help of others. God 
does not. "If I were hungry I would not tell thee." 
Ps. 50:12. It is self which does not know when the 
end of the world shall be. God does. 

Thus we see the need of self-renunciation in order to 
be Godlike. And of self -crucifixion to have His power. 
But we shall not, in our zeal, seek to crucify self all at 
once. This would be to hasten our death. We may 
wholly renounce self, so far as we know, at once. This 
is not crucifixion. Crucifixion hurts. We need not 
try to bring the hurt upon ourselves. The adversary 
will attend to that as soon as we have renounced self 
and can stand the pain, just as he pained Christ after 
final renunciation. See Luke 23 :34, 46. 

We must not fail to clearly distinguish between self- 



56 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

renunciation and self -crucifixion in God's service. Self- 
renunciation comes once for all when we give our- 
selves up wholly to God, at the beginning of a conse- 
crated life, just as the Father's renunciation of Him- 
self took place with the beginning of creation. But 
self -crucifixion takes place all along the way of our 
Christian life, as we come, in each instance, to our 
place of crucifixion. 

For so it was with God. Many times had Self been 
crucified in Him as His children turned against Him 
in rebellion and ingratitude, before Christ's coming. 
But it was only during Christ's ministry in the flesh 
that He was crucified in the flesh. And although Christ 
had to suffer the crucifixion of Self in the flesh many 
times when *'His own received Him not," He was not 
crucified upon the cross until the very last. This was 
the climax and the inclusion of all the previous cruci- 
fixion He had endured in the flesh. 

It was the most humiliating death He could die. 
Therefore crucifixion of the flesh was the most perfect 
He could experience, through this very suffering. That 
is why this particular kind of death should be the 
means of drawing all men to Him. "And I, if I be 
lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." 
Jno. 12:32. In order for God's renunciation of Self 
in the flesh to reach all men in His love for them, as 
effectually as though the flesh should not be a barrier 
for men's approach to God, His Self had to be wholly 
crucified. And it took the death on the cross to show 
this. Had a more ignominious death been common it 
would have required that. 

And yet we must know that in God's perfect renun- 
ciation of Self there was the perfect union with a Self 
wholly given for others. 



CHAPTER III. 
"If we suffer we shall also reign." 

Since Christ's crucifixion in the flesh was so perfect, 
when we, as His children, suffer equal crucifixion of 
our flesh or natural man, there can be absolutely noth- 
ing between our lives and God's power in heaven. 

So, renunciation prepares us for crucifixion. But 
when each new and greater crucifixion comes it hurts 
as in each previous instance, and we must look to God 
for grace to bear it, just as Christ did time after time. 
See Luke 2:51. Matt 4:11. Luke 6:11, 12. 22:42. 
23 :34, 46. Heb. 5 :7. God knows none of us can bear 
complete crucifixion of self all at once and live. But 
He knows we shall wish to, when we love Him with 
all our "heart, soul, and might." And in His abundant 
love He has made provision whereby we may have the 
joy of His fellowship in Heaven's power anyhow. 

This is by appointing a sphere of perfect work for 
each of His children who have wholly renounced self. 
That is, a place as a member of Christ's spiritual body, 
"every one in the body as it hath pleased Him." 1 Cor. 
12:18. In this one place "the manifestation of the 
Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. For to 
one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to an- 
other the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; to 
another faith by the same Spirit," etc., etc. Ver. 7-9. 

This means that in the line of one's "gift" of the 
Spirit he may bear such complete crucifixion and con- 
suming of self that all of God's power is at command 
in that particular line. For it is God's Spirit referred 



58 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

to, and God*s gifts are perfect. The only reason why 
we do not see this manifested more is that the recipient 
of the "gift" has not permitted complete crucifixion 
and consuming of self in that particular line, or in any 
other line. 

When he is wholly submissive to God in the line of 
his "gift of the Spirit" he need not even supplicate in 
prayer. For God fills him constantly with ability to 
discharge Heaven's blessings to others in response to 
their receptive "touch." But in other lines he must 
take himself into battle in each instance until he has 
wholly crucified self anew, when God will answer just 
as in the line of his "gift." When self is consumed in 
line after line of ministry gift after gift will be be- 
stowed upon one. 

In other words, the exercise of his gift of the Spirit 
is an appointed, blessed ministry, so full of God's wait- 
ing to respond that he is instructed to merely "ask and 
ye shall receive, that your joy may be full." Jno. 16 :24. 
And he feels that he and God can move mountains, as 
they can. But in a ministry not perfected, or in other 
lines, he has anxiety or fear as to results, or he is 
tempted with vain glory when successful. He must 
therefore renounce and crucify self again before God 
always answers as in the sphere of his gift, or gifts, 
if he receives more than one. 

Now he may not even know what his "gift of the 
Spirit" is. It has not yet been "manifested." Perhaps 
self -crucifixion has been scattered over so many lines 
that it does not amount to sufficient in one particular 
line for him to receive a special gift. Self has not been 
consumed. And he may need the help of one who is 
gifted of the Spirit to aid him to know. For the one 
who has the gift of "discerning of spirits" is fitted to 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 59 

that office, notwithstanding that the common interpre- 
tation of this gift is to detect good from evil spirits. 
The spiritual "body'* of Christ, without a member pos- 
sessing this "gift of discerning" is certainly as helpless 
to reach its highest usefulness as a human being is to 
do his best when he is unable to recognize his right 
use of the various members of his body and faculties 
of his mind. We often see this occur in both. 

Where one does not know, a significant rule is that 
jealousy of others is almost certain to spring up in the 
heart when one is out of his right place as a member 
of the Lord's "body." The purest heart can scarcely 
help becoming jealous when out of place without know- 
ing it. But in the place God has appointed each one 
he surely excels, conscious that "if God be for us who 
can be against us?" Or even if others at first excel in 
that sphere he is anxious, without jealousy, to learn 
of them. 

Where one's duty lies in a ministry outside of the 
use of his special gift he may do it with a heart free 
from jealousy or envy, by a quiet consciousness it is 
of the Lord, for the time being. His gift may be that 
of a "help." 1 Cor. 12 :2g. In the perfect use of any 
gift of the Spirit one is never puffed up, but, rather, 
humiliated. Experience of one's greatest joy in a spe- 
cial line of God's service may also be taken as an index 
to the sphere into which he is called. For it is there 
that self is soonest out of God's way. 

A recognition of these things is very important. The 
Spirit will manifest the power of God under our direc- 
tion only upon lines where self has been sufficiently 
crucified. And God's power will surely be perfect 
through us in that line in proportion to the complete- 
ness of the crucifixion of self. God's grace is sufficient 



60 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

that we may bear the self -crucifixion and consuming 
necessary for at least one gift of the Spirit in perfec- 
tion. As we suffer it to the perfect use of one gift He 
will bestow upon us other gifts accordingly, as we bear 
the necessary consuming for the respective use of each. 
There is no limit to the gifts of the Spirit we may re- 
ceive, until we reach Christ's perfection of power, ex- 
cept our own unwillingness or inability to bear the cru- 
cifixion necessary to take self out of God's way. 

The more narrowly we may confine our ministry in 
the Gospel to the exercise of our special gift of the 
Spirit the more we may expect to progress in its per- 
fect use. Or in our several "gifts" if we receive more 
than one. In the meantime ''in honor preferring one 
another" we do not transgress upon the other "mem- 
ber's" sphere in the "Body." Self and never God leads 
into such error. When self attempts to minister in 
the sphere of a gift of the Spirit bestowed upon an- 
other member, and not upon us, we truly fail to "es- 
teem others better than ourselves," regardless of the 
courtesy or honor we shower upon them in other ways. 
The trespass is against the assignment of God's Spirit, 
therefore curtails His power through both ourselves 
and the one whose place we seek to occupy. 

This error is more commonly made in the sphere of 
teaching than perhaps in any other gift of the Spirit. 
For this is a distinct gift of the Spirit. Rom. 12 :7. It 
is given to a very few because each child of God has 
received an anointing of the Holy Spirit for his own 
personal use, so perfect that he is assured "ye need 
not that any man teach you." 1 Jno. 2 :27. That is, to 
teach them the way of salvation. They may need the 
help of one with the gift of the Spirit to teach them 
how to develop and use effectually the life within them 



THE INFINITMy INTRINITY AND UNITY 61 

which is saved. This is the sphere of the teacher. It 
is to unfold the very Word of God by which the other 
received salvation. To unfold it in a salvation of rich- 
ness and depths which none can perceive except 
through the gifts of the Spirit, of wisdom or knowl- 
edge, as well as of teaching. 

Teaching is attempted by almost every one who re- 
ceives a special blessing of the Lord. Doubtless it was 
so in the days of the Apostles, for James found it nec- 
essary to write, "My brethren, be not many masters, 
(Lit. teachers) knowing that we shall receive the 
greater condemnation." Jas. 3:1. Every one who at- 
tempts to teach without the gift of the Spirit for such 
ministry is under God's condemnation. He is neglect- 
ing the other gift God has for him, and is transgress- 
ing upon another man's duties. And it is usually such 
transgression as will hinder the ones he "teaches" from 
receiving the true unfoldment of the Word from one 
called of God to teach. The latter teaching is eternal, 
just as the Word it unfolds will stand, though heaven 
and earth shall pass away. Matt. 24:35. 

Although few are called to be teachers, a much 
greater number may be called to prophesy, not neces- 
sarily by foretelling hidden things of the future, but 
by instructing their hearers what they shall do now 
for salvation or God's blessing, or by manifesting God's 
Spirit for the time being. Many call this teaching, 
but the Bible makes a distinction. 

It is referred to in 1 Cor. 13 :9, 10 — "We know in 
part, and we prophesy in part." That is, of things 
that are a present part of the eternal. "But when that 
which is perfect (reaching to the end) is come, then 
that which is in part (true in the present) shall be 
done away. The distinction between prophesying and 



62 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

teaching is seen by comparing Acts 2:17 and 1 Cor. 
11:5 where the former is encouraged, with 1 Tim. 2: 
12-14 and Jas. 3:1 where the latter is forbidden. 

And so this is God's way : first, unity. Second, re- 
nunciation of Self as illustrated in Christ Jesus, for 
the sake of children. Then unity again of all who 
become His children through a like Spirit. 

And it is the way of man, made after the likeness 
of God. First unity with self in the abandoned joy of 
a little child who knows no care. As reason develops 
and concern for self becomes habitual the Holy Spirit 
of God moves upon us to yield to God's way of a greater 
life. When we hear, and endure crucifixion sufficiently 
we may be as a little child again, but with the conscious 
power of God and the joy of His perfect kingdom in 
our heart. 

We talk about being filled with the Holy Spirit, not 
realizing what that Spirit is. We are sometimes very 
much delighted in ourselves and we think it is the Holy 
Spirit which makes us so. But it is not. When we are 
required to renounce self in giving way to our enemy 
how quickly we droop ! It shows that our delight was 
centered in self and not in others. 

We were indeed * 'filled with the Spirit" in every 
place where we had room for Him. For we wanted to 
please God. But we had so little room that when oppo- 
sition came the spirit of self, and not the spirit of self- 
renunciation, controlled. The only true evidence that 
one is being controlled by the Holy Spirit is that we are 
renouncing self in happiness which is as perfect amidst 
opposition as amidst favor. And if we find ourselves 
lacking let us know assuredly this is the goal for us 
to reach. For the Holy Spirit of God proved Himself 
stronger than the spirit of self in the beginning. His 



THE INFINITMrIN TRINITY AND UNITY 63 

Spirit is in us, stronger than the spirit of self. We 
must simply make room for the same spirit for whom 
God made room in Himself, then. 

The Holy Spirit is the stronger today. When He is 
in a community through many who accept Him wholly 
in complete renunciation of self, a spiritual revival 
never fails to move souls in mighty waves which the 
adversary can not withstand. When men meet in the 
name of Christ and revivals fail to follow there is a 
spirit of self centered somewhere. None but the Holy 
Spirit may be able to locate the spirit of self, so wily 
is the adversary. 

Unconsciously we may center self in some other per- 
son. We want the other person healed or saved or 
prospered, and are selfish in what we think is unselfish- 
ness. We should want God regardless of where or how 
He manifests Himself in people. Or we center self in 
a meeting, desiring above all things its "success." Or 
with a distorted view of God we center self in Him, 
looking for Him to manifest Himself in a certain way, 
instead of desiring Him to come in any way He chooses, 
or in the way some one else expects Him. 

Before we have learned to love God with all our 
heart, soul, and might, however, there often comes the 
thought that to renounce self is to lose one's individu- 
ality. This is Satan's reasoning, and not God's. It is 
deceptive, for it is the very opposite of the truth. It 
is when self is renounced and crucified that one's indi- 
viduality is preserved forever. And it is when self is 
retained that we are doomed to pass away as the flower 
of the grass. The scripture means all of this which 
says, 

"Whosoever will save his Hfe (for self) shall lose it ; 
but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the 



64 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

gospel's the same shall save it." Again, "whosoever 
hath (free of self) to him shall be given, and he shall 
have more abundance: but whosoever hath not (for 
God*s service) from him shall be taken even that he 
hath." Matt. 13:12. 

Thus it is that our education, our expressions, our 
talents, our natural gifts, powers, etc., which differen- 
tiate us from other children of the Lord, when re- 
nounced in self and used in the Holy Spirit to bless 
others, shall live for them forever. 

For example, there is something in man's nature 
which reaches out for dominion as distinctly as the 
first man was commanded to "have dominion." Gen. 
1 :28. His ambition is to rule the greatest thing in his 
own little world of comprehension. It is the com- 
mand of God in him as at the first. 

His highest ambition may be in the power of knowl- 
edge or of command or influence or union or love, etc. 
Accordingly as self is renounced and crucified and God 
rules in him will he attain to it perfectly. And the 
nearer his ambition coincides with God's eternal love 
and purposes the larger may be his life of service in 
the "Body" of Christ. Therefore it is that the gifts 
of "wisdom" and "knowledge" are mentioned first in 
Paul's enumeration of "gifts" in 1 Cor. 12:8. For 
therein is largeness of eternal life, agreeing with 
Christ's words in Jno. 17:3. And to know God is to 
know love. 

Verily, self being the only thing that stands between 
the redeemed soul and the manifestation of God's per- 
fection in this world, the adversary will use his subtlest 
and strongest powers to withstand the elimination of 
self. He will make us think we are dead to self when 
we are only sleeping. He will make us selfish in seek- 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 65 

ing to be freed from self. We must remember the only 
perfect death of self which has ever been manifested 
in all ways was when God died to Self, in Christ, on 
Calvary. And that it is through receiving this self- 
renouncing God into all parts of our being that we are 
made free now. 

He does not strive. He does not worry. Is not per- 
plexed. But He comforts in the Holy Ghost with such 
comfort that when we are sufficiently open to His 
reception both the Father and the Son come into us 
and sup with us and we with them. And yet, in all of 
these, and countless other things, self will insert self if 
possible. We must remember always that perfection 
of our work is never a barrier against Satan under- 
lying it. Nor imperfection any evidence that he is in 
it. The same thing may shift rapidly, and one moment 
be of Satan and the next of God, according to the en- 
trance of self in it or of self -elimination. 

We may be compelled to shift our position upon any 
matter very quickly for God and not self to rule. For 
instance, one moment we may denounce medicine as 
being of Satan. Self enters, and God requires self- 
crucifixion in our own necessity of resorting to medi- 
cine when there is no other way. Or we may give all 
of our goods to the poor. Self takes such delight in it 
that we must change in order to crucify self and per- 
mit God to enter. 

Or, seeing the evil of the love of money, as God's 
stewards we may refuse to receive it in payment for 
services, upon scriptural grounds. But self may be 
hidden in this very refusal, so that we have erred. We 
come into hard lines and take this as a "test of our 
faith," when really our Father's hand was in the gift, 
which we failed to discern, as in chapter six. 



66 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

When self is wholly eliminated so that God in us is 
"all and in all/' we may know that gifts can not be be- 
stowed nor medicines offered to us except it is His 
blessed will. For then He absolutely controls every- 
thing which can affect us. When we see it in this 
light we are blessed as in heaven. 

It is His own way. He has so wholly permitted His 
Self to be crucified that He knows there is not a thing 
man can do or offer or think which does not contribute 
to the glory of His own unity in the end, regardless of 
appearances, as noted in the following chapters. There- 
fore, in the blessed renunciation of Self He is in heaven 
now. We shall be with Him when self is both re- 
nounced and wholly crucified. And we may walk with 
head and heart in heaven and hands and feet upon 
earth, even now, in seasons when self is eliminated. 
For ''He hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in 
heavenly places in Christ." Eph. 1 :3. 

Every **I will" we utter when self is eliminated shall 
come to pass, regardless of how great the deed. For 
it is then God in us which says it. It was when Self 
was renounced that God spake in creation, ''Let" it be 
done and it was done. The trouble with us is that our 
tongue is not under control of the Holy Spirit in so 
many "I wills" we utter. Most of our testimony given 
"for the glory of God" has self in the God whom we 
would glorify, if not in our words. 

Reason for self was the "serpent" "more subtile 
than any beast of the field which the Lord has made" 
in Adam's garden, and that is the "serpent" still which 
bruises man's "heel" in every walk in life, and whose 
"head" he must bruise with Christ within, for victory. 
In every prayer of faith, God answers the moment self 
is out of His way. The answer may come immediately 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 67 

or not for months, according to our ability to receive. 

There are many lives filled with acceptable prayers 
to God, but no answers are seen as might be looked for. 
It is because self is in the person to hinder the mani- 
festation of the answers. If, while one still lived upon 
earth, he could become wholly free of self, and pos- 
sessed purely of the Holy Spirit, every prayer he has 
ever offered to God would be at once answered. For 
they are all treasured before Him. No doubt this is 
referred to in Rev. 5:8, as ''golden vials full of odours, 
which are the prayers of the saints." For prayers are 
elsewhere referred to as odorous incense. See Rev. 
8:4. Ps. 141:2. 

Therefore we may expect mighty wonders of God 
whenever a group of persons crucify self so completely 
that the Holy Spirit of self-renunciation has full right 
of way. For not only would their prayers be answered 
then, if they should pray, but "before they ask" (See 
Isa. 65:24) many prayers which have been asked 
through the ages, by others, would be answered upon 
earth through them. These should hold "golden vials 
full of odours" to pour out upon the earth. Such a 
company of persons, however, should be so close to 
God that they are above the life of supplication in 
prayer and upon the plane of acceptance with Christ 
in the Father, as we notice in chapter twelve. It is 
a life of prayer which is constant communion with God 
who is giving them all things without their need of 
asking. 

Is any price too great to pay for such a walk with 
God upon earth? When men and women experience 
it the coming of Christ upon earth as noticed in another 
chapter will not be at all surprising to them. For have 
not holy women without number reached out with pure 



68 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

hearts to God for motherhood, wholly independent of 
either desire or consciousness of the flesh? 

How previous prayers are answered the moment self 
is out of God's way was illustrated by the man who 
had been healed many times, and was one day prayed 
for that he should be healed of rheumatism. He ex- 
perienced no benefit whatever. He wondered. Then 
he heard the voice of the Lord tell him to give the 
dime he had in his pocket to the elders, to use for the 
poor. He flushed inwardly. For he was used to giving 
dollars, and he had no dollar just then to give. It 
should humiliate him to offer it as an alms. There- 
fore he withheld it. A little later the voice of the Lord 
prevailed, and the moment he gave the coin he was 
healed of all rheumatism. 

It is God's way, and as it is in individuals, of them- 
selves, it is amidst groups or generations of individuals, 
each possessing the same life of God in themselves. For 
they are all one life, regardless of individuality in the 
human, and notwithstanding the period of their so- 
journ upon earth is separated by centuries of time. 

Finally, we shall discriminate between a life of one- 
ness with God through self-renunciation and the 
growth of that life through confession. ''Without the 
shedding of blood there is no remission of sins." That 
is, there is no removal of the separation between us 
and God (which is *'sin") without self-renunciation, 
represented in the blood, or life given for others. But 
after we receive life from God in this way the life 
grows by overcoming self in us. It does this both by 
restitution where possible, and confession of faults. 
In restitution all powers of self are given up to God 
in service for others. In confession of faults there is 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 69 

humility which prevents the faults reasserting them- 
selves. See Jas. 4:15. 

Wrongs done to fellow members in the "Body'* and 
unconfessed are perhaps the source of more failures 
to enter into the fulness of Christian life than any 
other cause. As truly as it is said regarding the 
Eucharist, "For this cause many are weak and sickly 
among you, and many sleep" — "not discerning the 
Lord's body" (1 Cor. 11:29,30), so many are weak- 
lings in spiritual growth because of "not discerning 
the Lord's body" in the other person whom they sinned 
against. For Christ Himself is stricken when a mem- 
ber of His Body is injured by another member. Con- 
fession removes the hurt and prevents a recurrence of 
the fault. Self-renunciation confesses. 

At the close of this chapter we should notice that, 
in a critical study of several terms applied to self in 
its relation to God, we must see clear distinctions. 
Self-renunciation, for instance, as represented in 
Christ and to be duplicated in us, includes crucifixion, 
consuming, and eliminating of self. We propose in 
spirit the first, but grow into it in fact through the 
experience described by the other terms. Self-renun- 
ciation is the giving up process. Crucifixion is the 
hurting process. The consuming is the transforming 
of that which hurts into overcoming joy, as in chapter 
eleven. And the final eliminating of self is when self 
is so consumed it is out of our mind or spirit. Self- 
renunciation, in fact, is complete, as it was in spirit 
at the beginning, when the eliminated self may be in 
our mind, but as another being than we, if we may so 
speak of it, considered impartially with all the other 
creatures of our Heavenly Father. 



CHAPTER IV. 
"The Life was the light of men." 

Christ has now gone to the Father, but His life 
still lives. Not merely does He live in the lives of 
those upon earth who accept Him by faith and can 
say with Paul, *'I am crucified with Christ: neverthe- 
less I live ; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me : and the 
life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith 
of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself 
for me." Gal. 2:20. Nor merely in those who show 
this faith by their works. Jas. 2:18. But Christ lives 
in the Father, eternal in the heavens. 

His life with the Father is different, in many ways, 
from the life which He manifested upon earth, just 
as the Seen differs from the Unseen, always. As, for 
instance, a thought, which infolds the Seen or the 
manifestation of the thought. But the manifestation 
does not always unfold or elucidate the thought. It is 
so with Christ in the Unseen, with the Father in se- 
cret. He is all that He manifested when upon earth, 
in every way, and He is still more which can not be 
manifested in any way, but must be revealed. 

"No man hath seen God at any time; the only be- 
gotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he 
hath declared Him." Jno. 1:18. And although Christ 
"declared Him" as plainly as spoken words and a vis- 
ible life and expressive eyes could do it, "God is a 
Spirit" who, after all, can not be revealed to the natu- 
ral senses. We must know Him through the Holy 
Spirit. 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 71 

And this is our privilege. The Holy Spirit is given 
power to reveal Christ to the disciples. Not merely 
the seen Christ whom they had already known, but 
the unseen life in Him, which they could not under- 
stand. It was the life hid with the Father in secret 
even while He was upon earth. For Christ said, 

"He shall glorify me: for He shall receive of mine, 
and shall shew it unto you. All things that the Father 
hath are mine: therefore said I, that He shall take of 
mine and shew it unto you.'* Jno. 16:14, 15. "At 
that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and 
ye in me, and I in you." Jno. 14:20. This they did 
not "know" during all of the time when they had 
heard and seen Christ. For it is knowledge which 
belongs to the Unseen. 

It is therefore possible for the disciples of Christ 
to know more than the life He lived upon earth, al- 
though so few know even that as they should. It is 
possible to know the secret life of Christ in the 
Father, and therefore the Father's life, according to 
our ability to receive what the Spirit has revealed 
for us, but which we do not know because we can not 
hear all He would tell us of this. 

That Christ desires us to know the Father is plainly 
declared in His own words. "He that loveth me will 
be loved of my Father, and I will love him (who will 
be loved of my Father), and will manifest myself to 
him." "I have declared unto them thy name, 
(Father) and will declare it: that the love where- 
with thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in 
them." Jno. 14:21, 17:26. "I and my Father are 
one." Jno. 10:30. 

Notwithstanding that Christ and the Father are 
one, Christ clearly shows that they are different. It 



72 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

is probably the difference between the Seen and the 
Unseen. In this way may we not understand His 
words, "I go unto the Father: for my Father (in the 
Unseen) is greater than I (whom you see) T' eTno. 
14:28. "He that believeth on me, (whom he has seen) 
the works that I do (which are seen) shall he do also ; 
and greater works than these shall he do (in the Un- 
seen) ; because I go unto my Father (in the great 
Unseen)"? Jno. 14:12. "I came forth from the 
Father, (in the Unseen) and am come into the world 
(where you can see me) : again, I leave the world 
(where I am seen), and go to the Father (in the Un- 
seen)"? That it is of the utmost importance to notice 
the distinction between the Seen and the Unseen in 
the Christ life we live, is apparent from PauFs words, 
"the things which are seen are temporal; but the 
things which are unseen are eternal." 2 (Dor. 4:18. 
We may be living a temporal when we think it is eter- 
nal life. 

How Christ's life in the Father differs, therefore, 
from the life which appeared in His earthly ministry, 
in their temporal or eternal characteristics, is worthy 
of our notice. And while much must be revealed by 
the Spirit to each one's consciousness, the written 
Word reveals a distinct difference for us to enter into 
with our understanding before the deeper things of 
the Spirit may be received in a practical manner. 
That is, what we know of living the Father's life 
which is different from Christ's in the flesh, must be 
regarded first, if we would be led into the deeper 
things of the Spirit pertaining to the Father. 

Even while Christ was upon earth a clear distinc- 
tion was revealed in the matter of authority and judg- 
ment. "For the Father judgeth no man, but hath 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 73 

committed all judgment unto the Son:" "and hath 
given Him authority to execute judgment also, be- 
cause He is the Son of man." Jno. 5 :22, 27. 

In Christ's earthly ministry, from His baptism until 
His crucifixion. He represented Heaven's authority. 
With a scourge of cords He drove the money changers 
from the temple. With authority He commanded un- 
clean spirits and they obeyed Him. '*He taught them 
as one that had authority, and not as the scribes." 
Mk. 1 :22. He rebuked scribes, Pharisees, doctors, 
lawyers, and cities. He brought the dead to life with 
the word of authority, and rebuked angry waves upon 
the sea and they obeyed Him. His very glance over- 
powered men or reproved them. Jno. 18:6. Lk. 22: 
61. And He spoke words and taught doctrines which 
should judge them at the end of the world. Jno. 12: 
48. To Him is still committed the directing of all 
rule and authority until they shall be no more needed 
in the world. 1 Cor. 15 :24. 

All of this is exceedingly significant regarding the 
Father's attitude towards His children who have been 
redeemed through Christ. For, not having authority 
over them Himself He can behold them perfect 
through Christ as He could not possibly do by retain- 
ing authority direct. And His children can approach 
Him with confidence that would be impossible with 
authority. For authority presumes rebellion, and re- 
bellion shows imperfection. 

Now, while this may be a closer analysis of the 
Father's relation to us than most persons enter into, 
and they may doubt our statement therefore, its truth 
is well established in what we see similarly between 
two people. For the very fact of authority between 
two persons, one of whom is over the other, forms a 



74 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

real barrier to easy confidences and close spiritual 
approach, which is very vital. The one who assumes 
direction, ruler ship, or authority over another can not 
possibly view them as being perfect. For though they 
be ever so tender and wise-hearted, the consciousness 
of their authority over the other one implies the lat- 
ter's inferiority or rebellion, and consequent lack in 
perfection. 

If the one who has authority is not sensible of this 
the other one is. There is a veil or wall between their 
spirits prohibiting a unity possible only in its absence. 
This may be indefinable, but it is there. And the 
universal fact that a person in secret trouble, and 
needing to confide in one of two persons equal in other 
respects, invariably chooses the one who is without 
authority, attests to its truth. It is seen also in the 
commonplaces of life, as when workmen talk about 
things together they would not broach to their em- 
ployer. Or children talk about their affairs in a way 
they would shrink from with the tenderest of parents 
who control them. 

Therefore, with the fact disclosed in Christ's own 
teaching regarding the Father's relinquishment of all 
authority and the execution of judgment, we see the 
possibility of approaching the Father as we can ap- 
proach no other person of the Godhead, notwithstand- 
ing the three are one. For, in beholding the several 
personalities of the Godhead, we see first, a nature in 
God which reproves us for our errors. 

This is distinctly the office of the Holy Ghost when 
we are living worldward. Jno. 16:8-11. True He 
comforts us when we heed His reproof, with Heaven's 
own sweetness, but we recognize a difference between 
His purity and our weakness and we fear His dis- 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 75 

pleasure. And as we look at Christ, although He dis- 
tinctly assures us His office is not that of condemna- 
tion of the world, but salvation (Jno. 3:17), when we 
measure our life beside His life the latter condemns 
us. Rom. 8 :34. For, although we have the same hope 
He had and has given to us, even the assurance of 
eternal life. His life in the flesh was one of continual 
authority and power over evil, while ours is one of 
many yieldings through weakness in the flesh. And 
this real consciousness makes us feel unworthy to 
loose the latchet of His shoes or wash His feet. 

But the Father, in the relinquishment of all judg- 
ment or authority, throws down every barrier to our 
close approach hindered by His position of superiority. 
And then, with the assurance that He receives us as be- 
ing made perfect through Christ's redemption, when we 
accept it, another basis of confidence in approach is es- 
tablished. And when we see in the sixth chapter, in 
further considering of the Father's life, that He is bear- 
ing within Himself the imperfections which appear 
in the world, we feel that He is upon a level with us, 
when we behold the imperfections appearing in our 
own lives. And we can realize in the depths of our 
souls a oneness with God through the Father that 
would be impossible otherwise. 

We may have never analyzed the matter in this 
way, but it will bear such analysis. To many it will 
give assurance, where doubts would rush in before, 
because His forgiveness seemed so unreasonable and 
unfathomable. But perhaps the greatest value of see- 
ing God in this way, is the knowledge we may receive 
through it regarding the life we are living in Him, 
and how to draw souls unto Him and manifest His 
power in the world. 



76 T^HE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

For the triune personality of our "one Lord" will 
bear this same analysis in not only each individual, 
because we are each complete in Him, but amongst 
separate individuals in their relation one to another 
in the "body" of Christ, or His church, which shall 
also be complete in Him. For "there should be no 
schism in the body" (1 Cor. 12:25), nor lack of con- 
fidence. 

That is to say, there is in each of us who accept 
Christ, in whom "dwelleth the fullness of the God- 
head bodily," (Col. 2:9) the three personalities of 
the Godhead, as noted, with the characteristics of 
their respective offices. Thus it is only through the 
personality of the Father in us that we can see all 
redeemed ones perfect, or become upon an approach- 
able level with the lowliest and most unfortunate ones 
of earth. So also in the church there are those who 
are called to minister respectively in the offices of the 
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, their respective min- 
istry being characteristic of the personalities espe- 
cially represented. And only when they minister in 
the Father's life can they see in all redeemed men 
and women the perfection of God, and love them so. 
And only then are they upon a level such that the low- 
est outcast or the one of lowest spirit can approach 
them in the fullest confidence. Hence the importance 
of this knowledge in saving and comforting souls. 

Before we may notice this in particular, however, 
we should get a clear picture of the authority vested 
in Christ by the Father, and the authority of the 
Father with whom He is one. For really the Father 
had authority even in disclaiming it in deference to 
His Son. It was the authority of His own will or 
wish. So sensitive was the Son in carrying out the 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 77 

very slightest wish of the Father that the Father could 
relinquish all authority over Him. Their unity was so 
perfect authority could find no place in the Father. 

Christ represented this unity after His resurrec- 
tion, when He had become "perfected." Luke 13:32. 
But prior to this He appeared, as said, with authority. 
But it was not ecclesiastical authority. Please note 
this carefully. He had no office of authority in the 
synagogue. The nearest to that we know of was in 
the recognition given Him as a teacher at Nazareth, 
and even this was taken from Him at the beginning 
of His ministry, when they cast Him out of the syna- 
gogue and disowned Him as a citizen of His native 
town. Luke 4:16-29. He refused the authority to 
baptize His own disciples (Jno. 4:2), or spiritual 
fatherhood over them (Matt. 23:9), or kingship over 
the people who desired Him to rule over them (Jno. 
6:15), or to decide as a judge between them upon 
matters of dispute. Luke 12:13, 14. And while ac- 
knowledging His own kingship He disclaimed author- 
ity as a king, saying, "My kingdom is not of this 
world : if my kingdom were of this world, then would 
my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to 
the Jews." Jno. 18:36. When He drove the money 
changers and traffickers from the Temple He had the 
semblance of authority, but semblance only, except 
in the spiritual. For they could have probably re- 
sisted Him before the civil law. He had no authority 
of either law or custom. 

And yet He had authority. It was the authority of 
His will which was, in turn, the Father's will. It was 
the authority of wisdom with which He spoke. Heaven's 
wisdom which scattered the foolishness of men before it 
as mist before the sun. It was the authority of judg- 



78 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

ment from heaven which should stand until the world 
should yield to it in the end. The authority of purity 
from which men hid their purest natural thoughts in 
shame. The authority of health from heaven which 
dispelled disease. The authority of right which cast 
out the spirit of evil at His word. The authority of 
abundance which banished poverty when there was 
not money to buy bread. Finally, authority over the 
tomb in which He lay, sealed by the mightiest powers 
of earth. 

After Christ's resurrection we see Him manifest- 
ing a life different from what we had seen. Not of 
casting out devils now, or of rebuking the wicked- 
ness of the world or of much reproof of His disciples. 
But it was a life of the most extreme tenderness and 
love and forbearance even when they doubted and 
were unfaithful. Not a life of manifest authority 
but one of yielding in love, as when He sought to raise 
Peter upon the plane of God's love in the commission 
He gave him, but finally descended to the plane of 
Peter's human love, as noted in particular in chapter 
six. 

It was the Father's life, which He manifested until 
His ascension. During this He wholly transmitted to 
them the authority the Father had given to Him. It 
was the life of love. The unseen life of the Father 
which could pass as readily through closed doors as 
open. A life from which they had seen the human 
self crucified, signifying there was nothing to hinder 
the unseen Father manifesting His power in the body. 
With this brief notice of His manifestation of the 
Father's life we turn again to His life of authority 
over the power of Satan. 

That is the life Christ lived in His visible ministry. 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 79 

And its secret was hid in the Father whence He drew 
His life and power. A secret that we know so little 
about, seeing that we know so little even of the Christ 
in whom the Father was manifested. If the disciples 
knew so little of Him until He was revealed through 
the baptism in the Holy Spirit, still less do we know 
Him except through a similar baptism. 

For the Christ with ecclesiastical authority is not 
the Christ who ministered upon earth. And the man 
who receives or assumes ecclesiastical authority is to 
that extent failing to live the perfect ministry of 
Christ upon earth, with the handicap attending such 
failure. For without question he is handicapped by 
such authority. 

This statement will be a stumbling-block to many, 
many in the church, who either have not received the 
baptism in the Holy Spirit, as noted in chapter one, 
or who, having once received it, are not walking in 
its increasing light. But they who walk in His light 
will readily perceive the truth of what we say. 

And to explain, the visible church, governed by ec- 
clesiastical authority, be it known, is surely of God. 
And the authority of her government is of God. One 
of the gifts of the Spirit is that of ''governments" (1 
Cor. 12:28) and she is commanded to exercise them. 
1 Cor. 5:4, 5. Christ anticipated a need of ecclesias- 
tical governments in His instructions to "hear the 
church," in Matt. 18:17, although these words do not 
establish them. He merely foresaw that visible gov- 
ernments in the church should be the outgrowth of a 
weakness appearing in due time, and would be neces- 
sary because of that weakness. But this does not 
imply that those who must exercise visible authority 
are thereby living His life of ministry in the highest. 
Or the Father's life of relinquishment of authority. 



80 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

How is it, then, that in the church, which is "the 
body of Christ" (1 Cor. 12:27) certain members are 
assigned to authority in the visible government such 
as Christ did not assume in the synagogue or san- 
hedrin or councils of the Jews, which was "the 
church*' in which He ministered? 

It was not so in the beginning and in the heighth 
of power, of the church. Then, although as many as 
three thousand were added to the church in one day, 
there were no governments that we have any account 
of. Doubtless many thousands were added, and still 
no governing officers. It was one continual living of 
the Christ life, even to the extent of disclaiming own- 
ership of possessions which were sold and the money 
laid down at the apostles* feet "and distribution was 
made unto every man according as he had need." Acts 
4:35. It is doubtful if the apostles assumed the au- 
thority of the distribution, but each person, as he 
was moved by the life of Christ in him as led into by 
the Holy Spirit took up his part of the work without 
confusion. Certain it is the disciples refused as "not 
reason" that they should take upon themselves the 
government of this work; but when complaint was 
made about unfairness or neglect, others were placed 
in authority over the business. Acts 6:2-6. 

And here we see the first occasion for visible au- 
thority in the church of Christ. It was because of a 
weakness requiring it. Some failed to hear the Holy 
Spirit sufficiently to live Christ's life within them. 
And instead of God casting them off because of it the 
Holy Spirit took charge of them in another way. He 
took charge of the entire body, because the weakness 
of a few hindered Christ's perfect life being mani- 
fested in the body. 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 81 

And the way the Holy Spirit took charge was by 
establishing visible authority in people to lead them. 
It was not the way of the Christ life. But it was a 
better way than casting off the weak ones for whom 
Christ gave His life in love. And should not the 
church, His body, give up the perfection of her own 
life which had been manifested until then, in order to 
save her own weak members? 

For that is what the church was doing — merely liv- 
ing the life of Christ upon earth. A life like His, in 
unity with the Father through the Holy Ghost. A 
life of giving herself for others. Of authority over 
devils and all diseases. Without possessions she called 
her own. A life of such melting love of the Father 
they could not fail of "having favor with all the 
people." 

It was "the body of Christ" in its most perfect op- 
eration. But when weakness in the body appeared so 
that she failed in manifesting Christ's life of earthly 
ministry the Holy Ghost came to the rescue by intro- 
ducing visible governments where the invisible had 
failed. 

Thus it was that ecclesiastical authority in a visible 
way began. And as the people waned in the Christ 
life within them in doing the perfect will of the 
Father, persecutions came and they were scattered 
abroad. But the same Holy Spirit was faithful and 
remained with them, regardless of how far they failed 
to live as Christ lived. And as their faith became 
weaker and weaker office after office in the visible 
church was established by the Holy Ghost until now 
the closely organized church has persons in authority 
over many departments, in addition to the early offices 
of bishops, elders, pastors, deacons, etc. And the 



82 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITT 

strange part is that the more compact the organiza- 
tion and the more faithful the authority in each office 
is administered, the more pleasing it is thought to 
be with the Lord. And they are astonished when a 
group of people with no "system" or "organization" 
or "authority" of leadership have the unquestioned 
power of the Lord in their midst as they have not. 
They do not understand it. 

The apostles could have explained it very well. They 
saw the Lord's power when it was greatest and when 
it was waning. And the waning was according to the 
need of visible authority in the body. They may have 
not recognized it in so many words, but we can readily 
see the truth as we look back upon it. And we can 
see their wisdom in refusing to assume any authority 
when complaints were received. 

If spiritual leaders in the church had always shown 
similar wisdom there would be a different story to 
tell. But because the leaders have almost invariably 
been the ones with recognized visible authority 
through many generations, the church has been split 
into factions, sects, and divisions in a way that would 
be heartrending if we did not know the Holy Spirit 
has charge and will faithfully keep them all in the best 
will of God which is possible. And we have faith in 
Him bringing all into God's unity who have a heart to 
live the life of Christ. 

Reason in behalf of the unity of Self in the church 
would say, "cast out the grumblers and the erring 
ones." The Holy Spirit of God's Self-renunciation says, 
"Let us lose self-satisfied unity in our select body, for 
the present, in order to save all, though it requires 
governments, authority, or even to become a reproach 
in the world." 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 83 

We do not wish to be understood as advocating the 
abandonment of organization of churches or assembhes 
in order to receive the Lord's greater power. For this 
would result in loss of power if organization is needed, 
as it usually is, with some one in visible authority. 
But what we say is that the necessity of visible author- 
ity in the church arises from a weakness in her ability 
to live the life Christ lived while upon earth. And that 
this weakness was not in the earliest days of the 
church, hence no necessity of visible authority until 
deacons had to be appointed. 

Truly, in every assembly, unless composed wholly of 
members so fully baptized in the Holy Ghost as to live 
Christ's life in unity with the Father, visible leader- 
ship will be a help and not a hindrance, through men 
led freely of the Holy Ghost. And if these same lead- 
ers, who are prevented, because of the authority they 
must assume in visible leadership, from the perfect 
ministry of Christ, were to look for spiritual guidance 
to those who are wholly relieved of authority but who 
give themselves ^'continually to prayer, and to the min- 
istry of the word" (Acts 6:4), heeding their wish or 
will even as those heed the Lord's will, the result would 
always be unity and not division. It was so in the be- 
ginning of ecclesiastical authority. 

In such an assembly there would be greater power 
than in the one with no authority of leadership, unless 
all of the latter live the life of Christ in the perfect 
leading of the Holy Spirit, which is not usually the 
case for a great length of time. Therefore confusion 
results and the assembly often breaks up or drifts 
under the authority of a visible leader. In the mean- 
time God's power is marvelously manifested, because 
an assembly which desires to be led directly by God 



84 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

meets with His favor in preference to one which de- 
sires to follow visible leaders, or which visible leaders 
persist in controlling. 

In any event, the Holy Spirit now controls assem- 
blies as best He may, in faithful tenderness and mercy 
to those who are too weak to manifest Christ's life in 
the flesh. Because of this the present is called "the 
Holy Spirit dispensation." 

In the millennium when Christ's life reigns upon 
earth it will be different. For each will then live His 
life of authority, not over people, but over sickness, 
poverty, wickedness, and all the power of Satan. For 
Christ's life will bind him during the millennium just 
as he was bound in the presence of Christ when He 
ministered upon earth. Rev. 20 :2. And then in heaven 
the Father's life of unity of all things, which is greater 
than authority, shall be experienced when "God may be 
all and in all." 

With this explanation regarding visible ecclesiastical 
authority as a handicap to living Christ's life upon 
earth, we shall notice what His life really contains for 
us, which we often fail to enter into, to say nothing of 
how far short we are of living the Father's life which 
He has now entered. 

First, it is really a life of authority. It is a life of 
the greatest authority earth or heaven has ever known. 
But it is not visible authority, as in the church or the 
world. It is the authority Christ represented. Author- 
ity to cast out devils, raise the dead, tread on serpents 
and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy. 
Matt. 10:8. Luke 10:19. Just as the Father gave all 
authority to the Son so has He in turn given all author- 
ity to His disciples, even to that extent that "whatso- 
ever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 85 

and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be 
loosed in heaven." Matt. 18:18. And *Vhose soever 
sins ye remit they are remitted unto them ; and whose 
soever sins ye retain, they are retained." Jno. 20:23. 
Even Christ exercised no greater spiritual authority 
than this and we know of no greater. 

But it is not visible authority. It is not authority 
of visible church government with written decrees of 
judgment of binding or loosing or of forgiveness or 
unforgiveness. But it is the spiritual perception of 
eternal laws of bondage or freedom, sin or righteous- 
ness whereby souls and bodies are bound or loosed be- 
fore God, and the power to free them if they desire 
freedom, or to bind them if they desire bondage. It is 
the power Peter had when he saw into the hearts of 
Ananias and Sapphira, and brought Heaven's bondage 
upon them. It is the power another Ananias (not one 
of the apostles) had when he said, ''brother Paul, re- 
ceive thy sight." Acts 9:17. It is the authority of 
Peter and John when Peter said to the life-long cripple, 
"Silver and gold have I none ; but such as I have give I 
unto thee. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth 
rise up and walk." Acts 3 :6. 

And if it be questioned why such authority has not 
been exercised universally in the church since those 
early days the answer is not hard to find. The Christ 
life has not been lived. That is, the life with authority 
from heaven in which there is relinquishment of vis- 
ible authority. When church leaders began to be chosen 
as bishops and deacons with visible authority, their 
invisible authority from heaven over evil spirits began 
to wane. For the two kinds of authority do not mix 
very well. Satan is an invisible power and must be 
vanquished by invisible authority. When a person tries 



86 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

to carry both kinds all eyes turn upon the visible. It 
is human nature and affords a good hiding place for 
Satan. There has been the hindrance. It is a hind- 
rance to the authority of Christ's life in His children 
today. It is visible authority. It has to be relin- 
quished to the very utmost before one can have 
Heaven's authority which is his heritage in the Christ 
life. 

This relinquishment is not only over those in the 
church but over every one, even in one's own family. 
God is a jealous God and will not give His unlimited 
authority where any other kind is retained. Visible 
luthority is not His kind. In order to have Christ's 
invisible, spiritual authority one must, like Him, sub- 
mit to all visible authority, to the entire crucifixion of 
the flesh which resents such submission, as noted in 
the previous chapter. To retain one's visible authority 
is to scatter one's power of authority. Although this 
be ever so little it is sufficient for Satan to intrench 
himself behind it. One can not exercise visible au- 
thority without self appearing, hence God's perfection 
in self-renunciation can not be manifested. 

If these things be true why has the church failed to 
see it ? Partly because the time of unf oldment was not 
fully here, as noted in the previous chapter regarding 
the return of the Jews into God's favor, now coming 
to pass. And partly because of the fact that what pre- 
vents closeness to God in receiving His power also pre- 
vents such closeness as to receive His wisdom regard- 
ing spiritual things. Ecclesiastical authority prevents 
both of these. Therefore those to whom we have often 
looked as leaders have not been able to see these truths. 
With the passing of Heaven's greater, invisible au- 
thority and its displacement by weaker visible author- 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 87 

ity, there was the passing of Heaven's eternal wisdom 
in the Spirit and its displacement by the temporary 
wisdom of the natural understanding. How could it 
be otherwise? 

The principle underlying it is in the recurrence of 
Paul's question to the Galatians, in but another form, 
"This only would I learn of you, received ye the Spirit 
by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? 
Are ye so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit are ye 
now made perfect by the flesh?" Gal. 3 :2, 3. 

Likewise, is not the church foolish, having received 
her Spirit of highest perfection of wisdom and power 
when none were in authority to divert her eyes from 
the Unseen, will she now be made perfect by the lead- 
ing of those whose ministry must necessarily be in the 
Seen, and in the flesh? 

The principle is repeated in the individual, who, 
having come into touch with God for salvation, health, 
and prosperity in the Unseen, permits his faith to be 
obscured or quickened by the things which he sees. It 
is not the faith of Abraham who rejoiced in the Unseen 
notwithstanding the Seen was all against him. 



CHAPTER V. 
The Father's Life. 

With the recognition of a hindrance to our living 
the Christ life, together with the character of His life 
in self-renunciation noted in the previous chapter, we 
are ready to consider the Father's life. It is distinctly- 
different from the life of authority over Satan which 
Christ manifested. For the Father beholds everything 
made perfect through Christ Jesus. 

That is, because of the redemption through Christ. 
He looks to the end in faith when Christ ''shall have 
put down all rule and all authority and power" over 
Satan, and when, in perfect unity God shall be "all and 
in all." Not only does He do this now but He saw it so 
throughout Christ's ministry. Nay, more, He saw it 
so from the very beginning of creation, when Christ 
was ''slain from the foundation of the world." Rev. 
13 :8. The Father's life is one of consuming love in- 
stead of authority, in which He has faith in His own 
power to melt all that would oppose Him in His final 
unity. It was this love of the Father Christ mani- 
fested in His crucifixion, and of which He spoke when 
He foretold that He should draw all men unto Him. 

Therefore Christ, who is now one with the Father in 
secret, also sees everything perfect through the re- 
demption He purchased. For, by overcoming Satan He 
has already gained the final victory. He sees no rebel- 
lion now, but only the flesh which holds our perfect 
God-life in bondage, after we have reached out for 
Him. He sees no rebellion against Him in all His 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 89 

creatures, but only bondage. It is not rebellion but a 
call for freedom of which Paul speaks when he says, 
"For we know that the whole creation groaneth and 
travaileth together in pain until now" with us, "wait- 
ing for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our 
body." Rom. 8 :22, 23. 

Is there not rebellion, then, now, in all the earth? 
Yes, but not against Him. He has overcome Satan 
once for all. But there is rebellion within and against 
His body, the church, to whom He has committed all 
authority and judgment, as noted in the preceding 
chapter. His victory over Satan was demonstrated 
to a finish when His work of redemption was "fin- 
ished." The church now occupies the place of author- 
ity He occupied while here. His triumph over Satan 
and the world was so complete that He will not even 
judge them, but judgment is committed to the church. 
For does not Paul say, 

"Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the 
world? . . . Know ye not that we shall judge 
angels?" 1 Cor. 6:2, 3. The church shall judge the 
world by His word (Jno. 12:48), representing His will 
just as He represented the Father's will. The final 
judgment described in Rev. 20:12, refers to the church 
judging according to Christ's word. "And I saw the 
dead, small and great, stand before God ; and the books 
were opened: and another book was opened, which is 
the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those 
things which were written in the books, according to 
their works." 

Therefore Christ can present us perfect before the 
Father, notwithstanding our life is condemned in our 
own sight because it comes so far short of His. This 
would not be possible if He had retained authority in- 



90 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

stead of committing it to the church. For then He 
would see rebellion in us, which is not perfection. It 
was only after He had overcome the adversary in His 
life in the flesh that He could return to His Father 
(Jno. 20:17) thenceforth seeing as the Father sees. 
And we who have received God through the Holy Ghost 
are not above our Master. 

That is, it is only when we live the Father's life with- 
out authority, having crucified the flesh, that we may 
see from the Father's standpoint. For until then we 
are not so completely submerged in God that Satan can 
not "touch" us (1 Jno. 5:18) with his deceptive views. 
For Satan does see things as being imperfect, while the 
Father does not. And so long as we do not see from 
the Father's standpoint we see imperfections in God's 
people and God's works. For until then we are not 
"perfected" in our ministry just as Christ was not 
until then. Luke 13 :32, Heb. 2 :10. 

And when we can not see from the viewpoint of the 
Father neither can we have His tenderness and wisdom 
and faith and love and power. For what will keep 
us out of His fellowship in one point will keep us out 
in others. And we do need His closer fellowship. We 
are halting and stumbling and in darkness because we 
know so little about Him. When we know man's re- 
demption of soul, spirit, and body has been perfected 
in Christ and many are so eager to enter into His free- 
dom, and fail, we know it is true as in the olden 
time, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." 
Hos. 4:6. Some one is responsible for this "lack of 
knowledge." 

We know the perfect truth is revealed in God's word, 
and so plain that "wayfaring men, though fools, shall 
not err therein." Isa. 35 :8. But they may not be un- 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 91 

folded in their deeper, sweeter mysteries except as one 
enters the Father's heart in his ministry to others. We 
need to know how to enter into the power of Jno. 14 :12, 
to do the works of Christ and greater. Of how to heal 
more of the brokenhearted, and how to minister more 
successfully to the poor. Of how to bring multitudes 
to God more than in the early days of the apostles, be- 
cause the means of communication to all parts of the 
world are better. Shall we permit wireless telegraphy 
to outstrip the intelligence of our blessed Holy Spirit in 
reaching with power into all parts of the earth ? There 
are theories galore about doing these things but the 
secret must be learned of the Father. One will be 
deceived in the brightest opinions of men. 

Hence advanced leaders into spiritual things must 
be relieved of all visible authority in the church and in 
their own families if they would have the light and 
tenderness and wisdom to bring God close into the 
earth in the work of the church. And in the purest love 
and sympathy will they uphold the arms of those who 
must exercise authority until others can take their 
places. This will lighten their burdens as Aaron and 
Hur stayed the hands of Moses "until the going down 
of the sun." Doubtless the need of being supported in 
the exercise of authority is why the scripture particu- 
larizes, "pray for all in authority." 

In this connection it is not amiss to observe reasons 
why women are not permitted in the scriptures to 
usurp authority over man in the church. And why the 
Holy Ghost will seldom if ever call them into positions 
of authority as the Lord's highest will. 

For, in addition to the handicap they should have, in 
common with men, in living the Christ life, is the fact 
that women are peculiarly adapted to manifestins: the 



92 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

tenderness of Christ in the Father more than are men. 
Authority incites self. With a quiet grace and tact not 
equaled by men they may minister in the deeper things 
men of God may receive of the Father. Her greater 
ministry than the world has seen is referred to later, 
and can be entered into only in the greatest tenderness 
of the Father's life. And this, not in obedience to 
man's authority, but in unity with him in deference to 
his will such as is greater than authority. For indeed 
he must behold her perfect in a manner that is impos- 
sible if he sees rebellion in her, such as his assumption 
of authority over her should imply. These are things 
concerning which we are not able to draw lines too 
finely, considering what the Lord has for us in the 
fulness of His precious Spirit. 

Many who love ecclesiastical authority will not re- 
ceive this chapter kindly. Some because of their love of 
the "pre-eminence** authority gives them. And some 
because they have read their Bibles with the holy idea 
that Godly authority is the highest goal of usefulness 
in the Lord's service. This seems implied in the state- 
ment that "If a man desire the office of a bishop he 
desireth a good work." 1 Tim. 3:1. For what man is 
of higher authority in the visible church than the 
bishop ? 

While it truly is the office of a good work, may there 
not be a better work? And his highest authority in 
that office is in the Christ life with invisible authority 
over devils instead of visible authority over men, after 
the pattern of "the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls." 
1 Pet. 2:25. And when we know that even such au- 
thority shall some time pass away in unity which is 
greater, as we enter the Father's life in the perfected 
heaven, shall we not esteem it the very highest of privi- 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 93 

lege to enter into the Father's life now, with Christ? 
For there it is that love melts opposition even of devils 
as no authority can overcome. Is not this one of "the 
greater works" of Jno. 14:12, manifested partially on 
the day of Pentecost? 

We see also this difference between the life of Christ 
in the Seen and the Father's life in the Unseen in their 
relation to those who receive ; the first is an atonement 
which is free to everyone, while the last is a fellowship 
which costs something. The first is salvation as a gift. 
The last is perfection as a growth. The first is had 
from mere belief in Christ in self-renunciation. The 
last from self -crucifixion following renunciation. The 
first flows out to all the world, a free stream of liv- 
ing water from the cleft in the Rock of Ages. To 
the last those who drink of the former and hunger for 
God's unity, come with gifts of humility and self sacri- 
fice to pay the price according to the fellowship they 
receive. 

There is a difference, then, in manifesting the life 
of Christ in the Seen and the Father's life in the Un- 
seen. In the first all we have is a free gift to all the 
world. Not a thing is retained. It is a life of active 
self-renunciation for the love of God, and of crucifixion 
of the desire to possess. It is the life Christ lived, with- 
out even a pillow of His own whereon He might lay 
His head. Matt. 8:20. And which He sent His dis- 
ciples out to live. "Provide neither gold, nor silver, 
nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, 
neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves; for 
the workman is worthy of his meat." Matt. 10:9, 10. 

And what was the result as to their suppHes? Hear 
their own answer when later He questioned them, 
"When I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, 



U THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

lacked ye anything? And they said, Nothing." Luke 
22:35. Why? Here is the answer again — when they 
relinquished the things of the Seen as Christ did, the 
Father's abundance in the Unseen flowed upon them. 
They had power, and the recipients of their ministry 
gave them gifts as they regarded them "worthy" work- 
men. They had obeyed Christ's injunction, "freely ye 
have received, freely give." For indeed they had re- 
ceived freely. Every one who receives Christ receives 
all of His power bestowed upon any of His disciples. 
It all depends upon whether self is crucified sufficient 
for them to use it. 

Possessions, like authority, can not be mixed. That 
is, the Seen with the Unseen. The former must be re- 
linquished completely if the latter would be had with- 
out limit in one's ministry. It is the Christ life. It is 
the life the church lived in its perfect representation 
of His "Body." Read it in Acts 4 :34— "Neither was 
there any among them that lacked — ^for as many as 
were possessors of lands, or houses sold them, and 
brought the prices of the things that were sold, and 
laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution 
was made unto every man acording as he had need." 

Now we do not say one can not live the life of Christ 
and possess things of his own as property. But as in 
the case of visible authority, he is handicapped in the 
possession of that which is not a present necessity. 
The abundance of riches are hindered from flowing 
unto him from the Unseen by the scant supply he holds 
for himself in the Seen. It is a direct evidence that 
self is not wholly renounced and crucified, hence self is 
a mighty bulwark preventing God's abundance from 
pouring upon him. His abundance, not only of ma- 
terial comforts to bless all men but His abundance of 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 95 

power to heal the sick, cast out devils, etc., etc. For it 
is self which hinders God's perfection being manifested 
in one's ministry, regardless of how it appears. 

But the Father's life in the Unseen — that is different. 
In whatever way one enters the Father's fellowship 
self must have been crucified. That is what it costs. 
Fellowship with the Father, as noted, costs more than 
salvation costs. 

And one's ministry in the Father is different. For 
others receive the Father's ministry through us ac- 
cording to their fellowship with the Father's life in us. 
This costs them something. We dare not throw the 
things of the Father freely to all any more than He 
does. They are pearls, not of salvation, to be had free, 
but of a hidden life that costs something. And if we 
scatter them free to all as in the Seen Christ life, we 
shall directly be intrusted with them no more. Many, 
many a person has lost power received of the Father 
through His precious fellowship by trying to give to 
those who cared not to pay the price. 

In this ministry one must wait, out of sight, until 
others come to them, regardless of the self-denial it 
costs. For the Father thus waits. It may cost humility 
and searching upon the part of others to find them, but 
if they are willing to pay the price the Father will draw 
them, if from the ends of the earth. Their needs must 
be supplied at the hands of those who receive of them, 
just as one who receives of the Father bears, with Him, 
the needs of the world, as noted in the following chap- 
ter. The abundance flowing upon them in this way is 
not scattered without regard to needs, but a store is 
kept for those who come in humility, even as the 
Father has a store of all good things for those who 
thus come unto Him. For it is not now with them as 



96 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

when they lived Christ's life of self-renunciation and 
crucifixion. 

Before one can have fellowship with the Father in 
possessions, self must be crucified, concerning visible 
holdings. Then it is impossible to hold or store or use 
a thing for self. Therefore a surplus can only bless 
others and not injure God's steward, which he now is. 
He can now be a wise steward of the riches and mys- 
teries of God. Is it not the Father's life Christ antici- 
pated for His disciples when, after their successful 
ministry in renunciation of all possessions. He looked 
forward to their life in the Father and said, "But now, 
he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his 
scrip: and he that hath no sword (to cut the Seen 
from the Unseen) let him sell his garment, and buy 
one ? For I say unto you, that this that is written must 
yet be accomplished in me. And he was reckoned 
among the transgressors : for the things concerning me 
have an end." Luke 22 :36, 37 ? 

That is. His crucifixion of the flesh, after which He 
would enter the Father's life of possession of all things 
for others. And the disciples who likewise were cruci- 
fied in self would have fellowship with Him in the 
Father, in thus possessing all things. They, therefore, 
who had permitted self to be crucified in their renun- 
ciation of all possession for self should become the per- 
fect stewards of the Father's abundance to be dealt out 
according to what was right. For they could no longer 
use it in any other way. 

When one gets self so thoroughly crucified regarding 
the things of the visible that he takes no account of 
what is given or refused him, or what is given out, but 
only the good of its recipient, self has been so com- 
pletely renounced that from the invisible of God's 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 97 

world all things perfect come to him as they are coming 
to the Father. But he shall not minister the things thus 
received, to others, as if he had authority. They shall 
receive of him as from one whose will or wish they 
love. His ministry is in a sphere where the finest laws 
of the Spirit govern, and if authority is either felt or 
manifested, the perfection of receiving abundantly and 
of its ministry is destroyed, and its increasing useful- 
ness retarded. For unity of will and not the govern- 
ment of rule envelops the Father's life. This is the 
ideal of Christ's injunction. 

"Your heavenly Father knoweth ye have need of all 
these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, 
and his righteousness; and all these things shall be 
added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the 
morrow; for the morrow shall take thought for the 
things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil 
thereof." 

Each person in whom any of the gifts of the Spirit 
are perfected in love is, in that peculiar ministry, called 
to represent the Father's unseen life. For ''every good 
gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh 
down from the Father of lights, with whom is no vari- 
ableness, neither shadow of turning." Jas. 1 :17. And 
when this perfection in the use of the gift is reached 
they shall retain it after the manner of the Father's 
unseen Hfe here noted. That is, by not giving indis- 
criminately upon every hand, but in retirement, know- 
ing that none can come unto them for the Father's own 
blessing except the Father who bestowed the gift draw 
them. Jno. 6 :44. For that gift is not salvation which 
we shall publish everywhere. But it is a ''pearl" that 
is not to be "cast before swine," or before those who 
do not appreciate its cost, or who accept it as their 



98 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

right, as a common thing. But each shall pay the price 
in humility of so coming in touch with the Holy Spirit 
that He will lead them to the man of God. 

In other words, it is the privilege of one who has 
any of the gifts of the Spirit to perfect their use so as 
to live constantly in touch with God in their sacred 
ministry. He then does not go around offering to 
"touch" people with blessings through that gift, any 
more than the Father goes about offering His perfect 
gifts to all who will have them. He waits for them to 
seek Him. So shall we who have His Presence in any 
particular way wait for those to find us whom He 
sends. 

But as He is continually blessing all persons, the 
just and the unjust alike, with minor blessings through 
the senses, as in the rain, sunshine, flowers, birds, 
bees, and trees, etc., so we shall shower minor blessings 
upon every hand. In this way do we win others to come 
to us for the perfect gifts just as the Father wins them 
to His very Presence when they see the need of Him, 
through revealing Himself first through nature. Like 
a coy maiden with charming manners to every per- 
son, to only one of whom she gives her heart, so shall 
we give our best and sweetest to everyone through the 
natural senses, but to only those led of the Holy Spirit 
as suitors of the Spirit's ministry may we offer His 
gifts from heaven. 

No doubt God's perfect power has been upon earth, 
somewhere, ever since Christ's ascension. All it re- 
quired to be manifest was that individuals in need 
should so humble themselves as to be led by the Holy 
Spirit to the ones through whom they could touch God. 
Most sick prsons have a feeling that somewhere upon 
earth is a substance to heal them if they could but find 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 99 

it. Is not this "substance" the faith of God in some 
individual? And is it not the basis of the "witness of 
the Spirit" in many, that they shall be healed by God? 
They pass away in their sickness and we wonder about 
it. Their witness was true. All they lacked was such 
humbleness of spirit that they could be led by the Holy 
Spirit to the ones who could reach God in perfection 
for them. The Holy Spirit is the spirit of self-renun- 
ciation, and few are sufficiently free of self as to be led 
unerringly by Him. 

It is also more difficult now to be led to the right 
"member" of Christ's spiritual Body for healing than 
to be led to Christ when He was upon earth. For they 
are scattered. Let a number with power be gathered 
"of one accord in one place" and may we not see a repe- 
tition of the scene when from the cities about Jerusa- 
lem the sick were brought, "and they were healed, 
every one ?" 

A failure to sacredly guard the heavenly treasure of 
the Spirit's gifts is doubtless the reason His perfect 
manifestation is so seldom seen. Instead, as soon as 
one has power or knowledge or wisdom direct from 
heaven he usually becomes anxious for all freely to re- 
ceive "his" blessing. He thinks he is unselfish in it, 
but it is really self which takes delight in doing it. 

In contrast with this is retirement of Christ from 
public ministry, until He was thirty years of age, and 
after that such seclusion that the multitude had to seek 
Him, and were sometimes forbidden to publish His 
works. It is the spirit of Elisha and Elijah who lived 
in retirement, but with Heaven's own power for those 
who sought anxiously enough to find them. Had 
Naaman himself entered Elisha's house in humility he 
would probably have been healed of leprousy at once. 



100 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

There was "no nation or kingdom" where Ahab did not 
seek for Elijah before the Lord led him to him for a 
blessing. So there are none whom the Lord would have 
find us for Heaven's perfect ministry but whom He will 
lead to us as soon as they are ready for the blessing. 
What a truth we overlook in our zeal! We minister 
much in self, but little in Christ's perfect life. 

Behold, even today **The eyes of the Lord run to and 
fro throughout the whole earth, to shew Himself strong 
in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward 
Him.*' 2 Chron. 16:9. When we know the Lord gives 
us a gift of His perfect Spirit, if our heart is "perfect 
toward Him" have we not that confidence that He will 
search out the earth for those whom He wants to re- 
ceive our ministry? And when our ministry is perfect 
to all who are thus drawn to us would not more receive 
a blessing than we reach by publishing our work of the 
Lord, when but a per cent receive Heaven's touch at 
our hands ? 

In the ministry the Lord chooses for us, if we would 
be perfect instruments in His hands, whether as indi- 
viduals or groups of individuals, we shall be willing to 
have it true with us as it is related in Eccl. 9:14, 15, 
"There was a little city, and few men within it; and 
there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and 
built great bulwarks against it; now there was found 
in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered 
the city ; yet no man remembered that same poor man." 
As we notice in the following chapter a part of God's 
nature is to joyfully bear a lack of recognition of His 
perfect work, and therefore as our faith of God be- 
comes perfected we receive of His same spirit. 

In all spiritual things we have much to learn. We 
advertise each new truth with lives given over to it in 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 101 

a zeal as though we had reached the top. But no. The 
mines of truth containing new and hidden riches, hold 
more for us than all the knowledge God has revealed to 
man from the creation until now. It only awaits our 
ability to receive. 

Men usually shut themselves off from receiving by 
themselves becoming the promulgators in contention 
of truths received direct from heaven. They found 
sects upon what they have received and the sect pro- 
ceeds upon much the same plane, mayhap, for centuries 
after the man has passed away. He himself pro- 
gressed in still greater truths very little beyond his 
first inspiration, for the simple reason that he did not 
hold his knowledge as a sacred gift of the Father, for 
only those who sought it. Had he treasured it, free of 
all self in the sense of a previous chapter, God would 
doubtless have continued to pour His deeper truths 
upon him as wonderfully as at the first. 

Here and there are men who die in disappointment 
because no one receives the truths they know are from 
heaven. The generation following immortalizes them 
for the limited truths they had disclosed, but which 
were not discerned while their authors lived. Had they 
continued writing, or revealing freely to those who 
sought them, content with only the reward of the 
heavenly Unseen, what joy might have been theirs and 
what volumes of truth they might have left upon rec- 
ord for generations which should receive it! It is the 
way of the unseen life in the Father. 

After all, the failure of being able to impart truths 
from the Father so that hungry hearts receive them 
comes from a lack of the Father's perfect love in their 
ministry. The hearers are afraid of the new. But 
**pefect love casteth out fear." It reaches where rea- 



102 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

son, philosophy, or speech fails to enter. It bears pa- 
tiently and does not criticise hearts which are hard. It 
simplifies in manifold illustrations as the Father sim- 
plifies Himself in all His creation, illustrating His love 
for us. It renounces self so completely that who that 
loves God can fear, or fail to see at last? 

The perfect spiritual organization of God's power in 
the church in the Holy Ghost dispensation will be rep- 
resented by some in visible authority, in the Holy 
Ghost. By others with only invisible authority over 
devils, diseases, etc., in the name of Christ. And by 
others still without authority as such over devils, etc., 
but in the name of Christ in the Father they will have 
melting love which consumes the adversary and sees 
all things perfect, bearing the appearance of imper- 
fection in a faith which "worketh by love" and over- 
comes the world. 

This may often be done through an understanding 
heart perceiving how the oppression of the evil spirit 
may be converted into a blessing of the Lord by coming 
into line with His spiritual laws. There is no devil 
which refuses to be driven out at a command in the 
name of Christ, but that may be consumed in this way. 
It depends upon the perception that is given one in the 
life of the Father through His own deep love. 

Thus may we see the unity of the Holy Ghost, the 
Son, and the Father as one Almighty God Manifest. 

Our life may change as we progress from living the 
life of Christ in the Seen to the Father's life in the 
Unseen, representing them distinctly or combined in 
our ministry to others. And there is this fact always 
with us, that the really eternal is the Unseen by natural 
sight. For it is found in the secrets of the heart, with 
self wholly eliminated in oneness with the Father, who 



> TEE INFINITE IN TRINITY AND UNITY 103 

in Christ, eliminated Self for oneness with us. And in 
the life which is seen in the natural we have our re- 
ward. But if we regard it and delight in it the life of 
Christ in us is that much fettered or replaced. For 
even in His visible ministry His delight was in fellow- 
ship with the Father in the Unseen and in fellowship 
with the spirits of men and women, as noted in chapter 
seven. 

We err when we try to have a part of our delight in 
the things which appear and a part in the Unseen. 
That is, when we anticipate eternal reward whatever 
in it. For it is not so. The Seen and the Unseen do 
not mix for eternity. Hence Christ says, "take heed 
that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of 
them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father in 
heaven." Matt. 6:1. And even if it is not in order to 
be "seen of men" but that we ourselves may see our 
pleasure in it, there is no eternal reward. Therefore 
Christ further says, "But when thou doest alms, let not 
thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth : that 
thine alms may be in secret (even from self) : and thy 
Father which seeth in secret Himself shall reward thee 
openly." Ver. 3,4. 

Two things will no doubt surprise most of us when 
we reach heaven. The first is the unspeakable glory of 
salvation in the life we receive as a free gift upon our 
belief in God through His beloved Son. The reward 
will seem out of all proportion to the little act of be- 
lieving. The other surprise will be to observe how 
slight a growth that life made after we had received it, 
through all the deeds we wrought while in the body. 
This growth will have been in proportion to the life we 
lived in the Unseen and with no thought of self in any 
form. 



104 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

But let no one misunderstand concerning this. This 
purely unseen life, free of self, is not a life void of 
pleasure. It is the very opposite. It is all pleasure and 
nothing else. It is so very rare that comparatively few 
get more than glimpses of it. These brief glimpses 
have such power that they flood with a pleasure not 
understood, many of our acts for self and in the Seen, 
so that we fail to locate the source of the pleasure. Let 
us once know its secrets and learn to live the life more 
and more perfectly if we would dwell in the nearest 
possible border land of heaven while we are upon earth. 
And while we are growing into it there is no sin in the 
enjoyment of things that are fleeting, unless we make 
sin of it. Let no vain hope delude us into thinking 
we are building for eternity in the things that are seen 
or in which self enters. 

The Father's life in the Unseen may be best illus- 
trated in its joy by the abandonment of self in a little 
child in his day dreams of a world peculiarly his own. 
But it is more than for many days. It is for eternity. 
And it is real, in divine intelligence that knows no un- 
certainty. The happiness in blessing others when self 
is wholly eliminated is a breadth of life whose sweep is 
beyond the greatest earthly life as the unseen world is 
greater than the seen. And as we enter more and more 
into that life more and more abundantly will the Father 
entrust us with the means of blessing others. In heaven 
all that He has will be at our command because all of 
self has been left behind. It will be so in proportion 
here. 

That is, in proportion to the crucifixion and elimina- 
tion of self will we be given freely of His stores to bless 
others. His stores of wisdom, of knowledge of mira- 
cles, of health, of peace, of seeing into the future, of 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 105 

herds and flocks, of silver and gold, of tenderness 
and love, of comfort and protection. All of these are 
wrapped up in His store of freedom of Self which the 
Father has in His life in the Unseen. 



CHAPTER VI. 
"And they shall see His face." 

When we are taught that Christ sees us perfect, with- 
out rebellion, as we reach out for Him, we may wonder 
why it is that we are in bondage to the flesh which holds 
our redeemed life from appearing perfect. Why, if all 
things have been redeemed by Him so that the scrip- 
ture says, "Thou hast put all things in subjection under 
His feet. For in that He hath put all in subjection 
under him, He left nothing that is not put under him," 
(Heb. 2:8), does the same scripture continue, "But now 
we see not yet all things put under Him ?" That is, if 
we are indeed made free in Christ, and all creation is 
subject to Him, why does it appear otherwise? 

Here again is the difference between the Seen and 
the Unseen, as represented by the distinction we first 
noted between the Father's unseen life in secret and its 
manifestation to the sight through Christ. But so per- 
fect a work was done in Christ in the sight and hearing 
of men that our eyes are content to remain upon the 
Seen. 

There was heaped upon him all the suffering men 
knew how to inflict. All the torture of mind they could 
bring to bear. All the stripes the law would permit. 
All the wearniness the flesh could stand. All the deser- 
tion friends and foes might give Him. All the disgrace 
of name and of character they could charge Him with. 
A death as ignominious as could be invented. A tomb 
sealed with the strongest bands of earth. And He 
triumphed over them all in love and kindness and 
freedom that was perfect. 



TEE INFINITE; IN TRINITY AND UNITY 107 

Men saw this and therefore they knew. It could not 
be gainsaid. The atonement was perfect, judged from 
all human standards. There was nothing lacking. And 
we are assured that there is the same freedom in the 
flesh for us that He entered. More than that, that we 
need not bear what He bore, for He has done it for us. 

Then why do we not receive it? Why have we not 
the freedom we see in Him after His resurrection? 
Why are we bound by walls and gravity and circum- 
stances ? 

Because our eyes are so much upon the Seen. So 
much upon the Christ men saw and heard, and too little 
upon the Christ in the Unseen, in the Father. What 
we have seen through the witnesses of His life upon 
earth is the greatest thing we now know. The life with 
the Father is far, far greater, as the Unseen is greater 
than the Seen. We have not known the unseen Father 
except as we have seen Him through the seen Christ. 
That at best is looking "through a glass darkly,** be- 
cause the unseen Father is millions and millions of 
times greater in every way than we have seen Him in 
Christ. His suffering for our salvation was greater, 
His humility humbler. His sorrow deeper, His triumph 
more victorious, and His joy in seeing to the end in 
faith is larger. 

Be it known therefore, that until the time when God 
shall be "all and in all" in His perfect unity, the Father 
is bearing all the imperfections which appear in His 
children. He is not going to perfect them, "For by one 
offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanc- 
tified.*' Heb. 10:14. But so long as He does not make 
them appear perfect He bears the blame of the imper- 
fect appearances Himself. He bears the contradictions 
of what He declares true. In the course of time He will 



108 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

prove the truth of His words, when He manifests Him- 
self so that nothing which opposes Him, nor mars the 
perfection of appearances, shall exist. 

Then if, in the appearance of imperfection all about 
us, notwithstanding the perfect atonement, we see the 
Father bearing these in His own Self we also see Christ 
in the Father bearing them with Him. And we there- 
fore behold a Savior who has borne the sins of the 
world upon the cross, but has not thereby borne them 
into oblivion, so that no results are seen of the sins. 
It is a Christ who has indeed borne our guilt until we 
are absolutely free through accepting His suffering for 
us. But He has borne the result of the sins of the 
world into the bosom of the Father. And He with the 
Father is bearing the imperfections which appear, in 
Himself, until His glorious unity shall at last appear. 

Was not all of this typified in the ''scapegoat" of Lev. 
16 :15, bearing the sins of Israel "unto a land not in- 
habited," or of "separation"? And so in the atone- 
ment Christ has separated our sins from us so that 
as such they do not inhabit the life born in us from 
heaven. Indeed this new life "can not sin, because he 
is born of God.^' 1 Jno. 3 :9. And yet the old flesh in 
which it dwells still has sin until wholly crucified, hence 
we are told, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive 
ourselves, and the truth is not in us." 1 Jno. 1 :8. And 
until self is wholly crucified and God's perfect work 
appears in every deed of the body, as it shall in the end, 
Christ is bearing our imperfections in the Father's 
bosom. 

Now is not this a greater Savior than one who would 
suffer for us a few years in the flesh, denying Himself 
for us, after which it is all ended and every one sees 
us perfect, and forthwith gives God praise and glory? 



TEE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 109 

Is not Christ greater in humility because, for our sakes, 
He is willing to bear the appearance of our imperfec- 
tions, and bear the reproach of the world who look 
upon us and laugh at the thought of a perfect work be- 
ing wrought in us ? And all of the time He knows it is 
just as He says, our redemption is "finished." We are 
perfect in Him. 

He knows it and asserts it before men and angels 
and devils. But few others know it. The world dis- 
putes it. Few saints believe it in the way He sees us. 
We say little about it lest we be misunderstood or it 
should lead to boasting. So it is really the Father who 
bears the thrusts at our imperfections appearing. 
Would He do this with joy unless He loves us very 
much ? And would He permit His work in us to be left 
in a way that through ages and ages He must bear the 
taunts hurled against His children because of their im- 
perfect appearing lives, unless something greater is to 
be worked out through His plan? 

Aye, there is a greater life in the end, for us, because 
of this very waiting. We see gleams of the greater 
from time to time, but only gleams. Every trial we 
bear and imperfection we overcome permits us to so 
view the greater that we are glad the weakness was 
there that we might overcome. There is a glory and 
strength we experience which we know we should not 
have had but for the overcoming. And we know that 
we could not have had the overcoming without the ex- 
istence of the weakness to overcome. 

And yet we do not overcome for the sake of over- 
coming. Nor is it greatness for the sake of greatness 
that this is God's plan. It is not that He shall be glori- 
fied for the sake of glory, which would bring His Self 
into His creation in a way that would be inconsistent 



110 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

with Him. But He has something beautiful and defi- 
nite for us which we should miss if it were not for our 
individual overcoming after we have been redeemed. 

For truly it is the overcoming of self while we are 
in this life, which overcoming individualizes us when 
we enter heaven. Without it we should be exactly alike 
there, because we are all born of the same Spirit. It is 
as we overcome one way and another, in the crucifixion 
of self, that we shall possess distinct individuality 
there. 

This is illustrated in natural life, in the instance of 
the incubation of an egg. Every egg which is fertile 
may be known by the life germ floating in the albumen. 
In a hundred eggs it is almost or quite impossible to 
distinguish between this germ in each. None of them 
possess distinct individuality. They all appear alike, 
as the same life floating each in its own individual 
sphere. 

At that time how illustrative of the first expression 
of spiritual life in every soul newly born of God, or of 
their testimony upon receipt of the baptism in the 
Holy Ghost! How nearly alike except for the fleshly 
channel of their expression. And as they shout and 
leap and sing and pray with great emotion the one who 
does not understand thinks it is all of the flesh. But 
no ! Not all ! It is but the germ of divine life floating 
about in the albumen of the human eggy sensitive to 
every sense of the flesh. And if all were taken to 
heaven at this early stage they would be so nearly alike 
one could hardly distinguish one from another there. 
The life of each is perfect when freed from the flesh, as 
it then would be. 

But God does not want us to be altogether alike there. 
No two things in creation are precisely alike in all 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 111 

ways, and heaven is not to be robbed of variety or free 
of individuality. Therefore God usually permits His 
children to live awhile in the flesh before entering 
heaven. This gives them an opportunity to grow into 
individualities distinct from one another. And they 
grow by overcoming self. Self is the albumen of the 
egg which is gradually consumed by the life germ, un- 
der incubation. The Holy Spirit hovers over each child 
of God to nurture the life born from heaven, as a hen 
covers the egg with her wings. Accordingly as self is 
renounced, crucified, and quickened into the spiritual 
life does our individuality form now for a life in 
heaven. And when self is consumed entirely do we 
emerge into the heavenly world as the chick emerges 
from the shell enclosing it. 

Right here we may wonder what shall be our condi- 
tion if we are taken to heaven before self is consumed. 
What shall we lack because of it? We shall lack noth- 
ing in perfection. We shall lack only in the greater 
distinction of our personality there, and our ministry 
shall be limited accordingly. True to the natural illus- 
tration, we shall appear as "one born out of due time." 
That is, as a premature birth. We are perfect, but it is 
only the hand of God which can release the heavenly 
from the self which was not consumed, and keep it 
alive. That we can not all bear crucifixion and elimi- 
nation of self completely while in the flesh is typified 
by Christ Himself whom Paul beheld as "one born out 
of due time." 1 Cor. 15 :8. He appeared to Paul as an 
"abortive" (see margin) because He did not manifest 
in full the largeness of the redemption. It was the seen 
Christ who could not manifest the perfection of the 
unseen Father. And He will appear, even in the Spirit, 
as an abortive until His perfect work is "all and in all" 



112 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

in God. Likewise our perfect birth shall not appear 
unto men until self is overcome in every way. 

We see then, that Christ is more than a conqueror for 
us. He is also a kind, tender Father to permit the ap- 
pearance of imperfection in we who are perfect, that 
by overcoming we work to ourselves an inheritance that 
fadeth not away. And He is loving and considerate 
and humble beyond measure to bear the blame of our 
weakness in meekness and long-suffering, before gen- 
eration after generation of His creatures who do not 
know how it is. None know sufficiently to love Him 
for it as they shall by and by. 

And because Christ is bearing our imperfections and 
the imperfections appearing in the world, in the 
Father, the glory of the Father has never been seen by 
men. It is so great no human being can behold it with- 
out being consumed by His presence. So great we can 
not see it through the Spirit dwelling in imperfect flesh. 
His glory shall never appear until the imperfections 
He is bearing in Himself are consumed. These are the 
imperfections in our flesh, and the imperfections of the 
world until it becomes reconciled to Him. These form 
a cloud to screen Him in the meantime. We shall see 
it all then. But it is after the world shall have become 
crucified unto Him in the destruction of all opposition 
to His will. 

This was typified in the life of Christ^s suffering upon 
earth. He was bearing our sins or imperfections in 
His own body, hence none saw His glory, except the 
three who were permitted to glimpse it upon the Mount 
of Transfiguration. The sins He bore clouded His glory 
so that there was in Him "no beauty that we should 
desire Him.'* But after the crucifixion of His flesh it 
was different. Then they who had thought He was but 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 113 

a man because of the flesh in which He dwelt saw that 
He was the very Son of God. And the Holy Spirit of 
God consumed all their human antagonism so that they 
cried out, "men and brethren, what shall we do?" 

So there are many now who do not perceive the glory 
of the Father which shall appear at the end of this 
world which He has purchased unto Himself through 
Christ, as His own possession. Eph. 1:14. They do 
not see the most glorious Father back of all which ap- 
pears. They grumble, murmur, find fault, criticise, and 
condemn among each other or concerning the things of 
the world. They do not see that all of this, without 
exception, is really against the blessed Father instead 
of culminating with the thing in mind. See Ex. 16 :8. 

They do not realize that even when they have been 
forgiven for "Christ's sake,'' who bore them upon the 
cross, and therefore removes their guilt, that the ugli- 
ness appearing in the wrong deed is now borne by the 
Father. And that when the finger of scorn is pointed 
at them with the accusation, "a pretty fellow you are," 
that the Father, who has purchased our perfection, is 
bearing the blame in His own bosom. Many, many, not 
realizing this, lightly do wrong and repent again and 
again, rejoicing each time in the freedom of soul be- 
cause Christ bore their sins. They fail to see that 
Christ only bore the guilt of their sin into oblivion so 
that they are again one with God. And that some one 
bears the contempt of the evil deed done, which lingers 
in the mind of many who see and blame. They may 
blame Satan for it, but after all the Father permits 
Satan to buflfet them. Therefore until Satan is de- 
stroyed and God is "all and in all" the Father bears the 
blame of sin in His own loving, tender heart. 

So, while we are free in soul from all guilt of sin, 



114 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

the bondage which appears in our flesh because we 
doubt and are unfaithful, the Father bears within Him- 
self. He bears our weakness through the flesh until 
He shall really manifest the freedom we are permitted 
to accept by faith. And we know He bears it with joy 
because of the glory He sees in the end of our warfare. 

There is therefore a life of God in the Unseen, with 
Christ in the Father, which the majority of Christians 
ignore, set aside, and trample upon without thought. 
At one time they are exalting the Christ who lived and 
suffered upon earth, because He faultlessly paid every 
debt which could be charged against them. Then, as 
they yield to murmurings and faultfindings, they are 
buffetting, spitting upon, mocking, and slaying the 
Father whose suffering and tenderness of heart was 
but faintly shadowed in the suffering and yearning of 
Christ in the flesh. He can bear it, but they can not 
afford to do it. 

It is such a life in the Father that they are called 
upon to live who have crucified the flesh until they know 
the Father as a person of the trinity. They are then 
conscious of God's unity in them, albeit that unity has 
not yet appeared. When His unity manifests itself in 
them then shall their lives appear perfect and His per- 
fect power shall manifest itself. It is no wonder they 
shall be misunderstood by the church at large who do 
not know the Father's life. If they were humble in 
deed and appearance in the ministry of Christ they 
must be humble in very spirit in the Father's ministry. 

So humble that they shall not fault any, but shall be- 
come sin (2 Cor. 5 :21) for all who have not learned to 
love God with all their "heart, soul, and might," so that 
they can continually present to God **every man perfect 
in Christ Jesus." Col. 1:28. They must be willing, 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 115 

like the Father, to be set aside in their unseen ministry, 
and to be ignored and avoided by many who know 
Christ, but not in the secret of the Father. To hide 
with Him from prominence and applause while they 
uphold all who minister in the name of Christ. Their 
only reward may be the greater sweetness of the 
Father's fellowship and unseen power. 

In the Father's life self must be overcome not only in 
the humility of bearing the imperfections of others in 
faith, but natural prejudices must be removed in fact 
and entirely as we progress. We shall see each of His 
children as perfect as we see Him, and love them as we 
do Him. This is indeed the application for us to make 
of the ''inasmuch" of Matt. 25 :45. 

For truly the imperfections we see in them we should 
see in our blessed Father Himself, could we look now 
with our brightest possible vision into the Unseen, as 
He is bearing these same imperfections in Himself. He 
is now clothed with them, as it were. They form a 
cloud or veil to screen His beauty from us. Therefore 
if we would behold His glory now we shall behold it in 
faith through the very imperfections of His redeemed 
ones, which imperfections form His garments. If we 
would now touch "the hem of His garment" we must do 
so by touching them in whose imperfections He is now 
pleased to clothe Himself as He bears them. It can not 
be otherwise. 

That is to say, we have a mistaken idea of God when 
we try to brush away the imperfections we see in oth- 
ers in order to see His beauty. It is not seen in that 
way. It is not when we go into the woods and ideal 
places that we get a better vision of Him. We then 
get a different vision, that is all. For it hath pleased 
Him to clothe Himself for a time in the imperfections 



116 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

appearing about us, notwithstanding what they are. 
When we run from them we do Him wrong. We are 
but trying to remove His clothing, in asserting our 
tastes. 

Because we get quiet and see Him in a way, we im- 
agine we have done it. But we have not. His garm_ents 
are there just the same. We have really missed a bless- 
ing we should have received had we seen Him in the 
clothes of His own choice. By seeking to remove them 
our hand darkens their fabric. Because we are earnest 
we receive a blessing and we think we have seen Him 
"face to face," as Jacob thought, at Peniel. But we 
have not. The clothing of the imperfections He is 
bearing is still there. 

Even though "the Lord spake unto Moses face to 
face, as a man speaketh unto his friend," (Ex. 38:11) 
Moses did not see His glory. When he asked to see it 
the Lord answered, "Thou canst not see my face: for 
there shall no man see me and live." "I will put thee in 
a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand as 
I pass by. And I will take away mine hand, and thou 
Shalt see my back parts ; but my face shall not be seen." 
Ex. 33:18, 20, 22, 23. 

This is a beautiful type of how He appears to us. 
The world in which we live is the "rock" from whence 
we view the Lord in the place "clift" for us by Him. 
The imperfections appearing as He "passes by" unto 
its perfect end are His "hands" hiding His glory from 
our view. And His "hands" are not inspiring because 
they are not pleasing. If we recognized them as His 
they would be more pleasing, because we love Him. But 
we shrink from them, then wonder why our happiness 
is not perfect. 

But often when, like Moses, we are eager to see Him, 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 117 

not having recognized His hands covering Him right 
by our side, He graciously discloses to us His "back 
parts." That is, He shows us enough of His glory to 
inspire us to follow on. That, and seeing His "hand" 
in the things about us, is the only way we can see the 
Father now. Only when the things which appear are 
perfected, and the dross all consumed as clothing that 
veils His glory from us, shall we be really able to "see 
His face." Rev. 22 :4. Then we may "see Him as He 
is," because "we shall be like Him." 1 Jno. 3 :2. That 
is, the imperfections now appearing in us and the world 
shall be removed and His own blessed unity shall ap- 
pear in us all. In the meantime "now we see through 
a glass darkly; but then face to face: now I know in 
part ; but then shall I know even as also I am known." 
1 Cor. 13:12. 

Therefore if we would see God in the simplest and 
closest way He chooses to appear to us we shall not run 
away from our surroundings and seek Him in our ideal 
of men and things. Instead, we shall let Him choose 
His appearance, and in all that is at hand we shall keep 
in mind our ideal and see it by faith in them. Our ideal 
of heaven and our ideal of God. For God has put the 
ideal in us and if that appears to us which seems to 
come short of it we are not in a corner of the world 
He has forsaken. We are only beholding the drapery 
which He has thrown over Himself and His heaven to 
screen His glory from us until we are able to behold it 
and live. 

Shall we, then, complain or fret or pine because our 
ideal is slow in appearing, as men count slowness? 
Shall we not, rather, love Him the more who is our 
ideal but who permits His own beauty to be obscured 
by clothing Himself in all that we see in the meantime. 



118 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

that is vile and mean in bondage, or which appears not 
right to the natural senses ? Was there ever self-efface- 
ment such as our blessed Father shows in all of this? 
And shall we not love everything the Father's tender 
hand permits to come before us, because of His love 
for us? 

But what if our ideal is not Heaven's highest? It 
will be so, time after time, in our bondage in the flesh, 
just as our ideal of the Christ has so often fallen below 
the real Christ. But just as we behold the Father and 
His heaven in the highest ideal we are able to receive, 
shall we be "changed into the same image from glory to 
glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." 2 Cor. 3:18. 
"Every man that hath this hope in him (to be and see 
like Him) purifieth Himself, even as He is pure." 
1 Jno. 3:3. Thus as our vision becomes purified when 
we become more like Him, our ideal changes into a 
nearer and nearer approach to Heaven's ideal. And as 
our ideal becomes strong and a part of us, in love, it 
becomes the thing we see, instead of what appears to 
the natural senses. 

Let no one fear that seeing and loving God in this 
way in the things which appear, regardless of their 
perfect appearance, is to lower one's ideal of God or 
of heaven. Or that to see Him only in things which 
appear perfect is to raise one's ideal. For the very op- 
posite is true. 

We love Him constantly when we love Him in the 
things which appear imperfect. For they are about 
us constantly. We love Him seldom when we love Him 
in only that which appears perfect. For seldom do we 
see it. It is God in us which permits us to see and love 
Him in all that appears. It is a God outside of us and 
in things, whom we can see and love in only that which 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 119 

appears perfect. We love Him not because of the 
things which appear when we love Him in all things, 
but we love Him in faith. We love Him because of the 
things which appear, when we love Him in only that 
which appears perfect. This love is not by faith but by 
sight. We live in constant happiness when we enjoy 
His presence in all that appears. We live in tastes of 
happiness when we enjoy Him only in that which 
appears perfect. 

When we love men and women in this ideal as we 
love God Himself we fulfill to the letter Matt. 25 :40,— 
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these, 
my brethren, ye have done it unto me." Then it is that 
our love will inspire them Godward with a power no 
visible ministry can accomplish. What a blessing we 
can be to all then ! It is indeed the unseen Spirit of the 
Father manifesting God's love through the flesh, which 
may be seen. 

And what may be our attitude in seeing unredeemed 
men and women, in the depths of sin, and the works of 
Satan on every hand? We merely see the perfect, lov- 
ing Father in the permission of it all for a time. While 
to others He is contemptible and mean to pretend to be 
a just God and yet allow the evil, to us He is the most 
loving. Self-renouncing Father as He is content for 
the time being to be clothed in the rags and filth of 
very sin itself, while mockers point to Him in derision. 

For we understand. And we love His world as we 
love Him, because of it. When we turn from them it is 
disservice to our heavenly Father. By the act we say, 
"We love you. Father, but we do not like your ways of 
permitting such things to come before us. We love you, 
but not your lost ones. We love your heaven but not 
the earth you are making into a heaven. We love your 



120 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

*back parts* but not your *hand/ We love your glory 
but not your clothes." 

This does not signify that we shall choose contempti- 
ble suroundings, but that we will let Him choose for us. 
If our lot is amidst poverty and dirt, no doubt He sees 
self in us needs crucifixion in a peculiar way that re- 
quires just the surroundings which have fallen to us. 
And when we see the beauty of His hand hiding Him- 
self from us we shall doubtless be given a different 
view. Our Father is not an aimless parent. Christ in 
the Father has not lost sight of our needs. But He 
sees the Unseen which we must be led into if we would 
have His greatest happiness, and He is doing the best 
He can to lead us into it. 

Our Father does all that the people will permit Him, 
both to bring His redeemed ones now into their final 
freedom of the flesh, and to bring the world to repent- 
ance. He does this visibly through those unto whom 
He has committed the "word of reconciliation," (2 Cor. 
5:19), and invisibly in the love wherewith He bears 
their shortcomings. When we manifest both the Christ 
life in the Seen and the Father^s life in the Unseen we 
do likewise. 

That is, like Christ, we reprove the world, not in 
condemnation, but by preaching God's will and then 
bearing the imperfections of the people in love. And 
we break the bondage of the flesh by seeing to the end 
when their perfection shall appear ; then in the strength 
of our Lord we bring that perfect end to the very pres- 
ent, and in commanding faith compel the sufferers to at 
once step into their inheritance. Or through the unseen 
Father's consuming love we draw them to see in us, 
notwithstanding the imperfections appearing in our 
lives, the very garments in which the Lord has clothed 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 121 

Himself. When they receive our touch as "the hem of 
His garment" they receive the freedom of the woman 
of long ago, who set the example. For this is indeed 
God's will — ^the "touch" of wisdom, salvation, pros- 
perity, or healing. 

Are all able to receive our ministry in this simple 
way unto their complete deliverance? No. Their 
doubts in the flesh hinder them. The seen life before 
them is stronger than the unseen. Though the flesh 
has been renounced it has not been suflficiently crucified 
to receive the Unseen in its strength over the Seen. In 
proportion as crucifixion of the flesh is complete does 
the Father's freedom manifest itself in them. 

It is so with each of us. We have a battle going 
on within ourselves after we have been redeemed by 
Christ. It is a duplicate in miniature of the conflict 
going on in all of God's creation prior to His final unity 
of all things. In us is represented both the seen life 
of Christ and His unseen life in the Father. The per- 
fect freedom which has been purchased for us and the 
appearance of imperfection which we bear until God's 
perfect unity has been worked out in us. 

Because of this at one moment we have a freedom 
and joy of heaven. It is when we have renounced self 
and have accepted Christ and the freedom He has pur- 
chased for us. The next moment we are weighed down 
by something we do not understand. It is in the Un- 
seen somewhere but we can not somehow find it. We 
say it is of Satan because we can not locate it elsewhere, 
and yet that does not satisfy us. It is instead the 
Father's life clouded in us, feeling the lack of perfect 
unity in all things, which lack He is Himself bearing 
in us and in all things. 

The Father knows the apparent discord all creation 



122 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

shows. He would be cast down in heart because of it 
if He did not see in faith to the end, the wondrous glory- 
to show forth and to be made greater by every imper- 
fection which now appears. And to the extent that the 
Father^s life takes a deep, true, personal place in our 
human consciousness will we feel our shortcomings be- 
cause of self which binds us. But with the Father's 
sight also in us we see by faith that each imperfection 
we may behold and renounce shall add to the glory in 
us in the end. 

Therefore, while salvation in Christ is free and is 
full of joy, conscious fellowship with the Father costs 
something. And even while we are right with God we 
may have great heaviness. It is not then of Satan. It 
is the Father's life in the human in unison with Him in 
the great Unseen, we bearing our imperfections even 
as He bears those of the world. Let His faith in us see 
to the end and we shall rejoice as He also rejoices. 

Our flesh is our little world as all creation is God's 
great world. The triune God dwells in each of us as 
He dwells in the world. We may conceive that if only 
the Son had to do with the redemption of all creation 
we should see it now in all perfection. If only the Son 
dwelt in each of us we might be as free as heaven 
through the redemption we have received. But with 
the Father in us also, bearing the imperfections of the 
flesh until His perfect unity appears. His glory re- 
vealed in us shall be greater because of each overcom- 
ing of imperfections which now appear. 

How beautiful to see both the Father and the Son in 
us in the bondage and freedom of which we are con- 
scious. When we accept them so, we see also the Holy 
Ghost as our Comforter to make the way glorious in a 
baptism that makes us love our "one Lord" with all our 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 123 

"heart, soul, and might." For indeed, this recognition 
of the Father in us bearing the imperfections which 
appear, instead of adding a weight to us, gives us a 
freedom that takes us to the end in faith such as over- 
comes the world. The consciousness of bearing imper- 
fections in unison with the Father is many, many times 
overbalanced by the glory in the end appearing so near. 
For more and more nearly do a "thousand years as one 
day" appear to us as they do to Him. 2 Pet. 3 :8. 

It is through a consciousness of both the Son's life 
and the Father's life in us that we see many words of 
Christ to be literally true which would be mysterious 
or beyond our comprehension otherwise. That is, the 
life Christ represented upon earth and His life now 
with the Father in the Unseen. We see that in our 
failing to manifest the truth of Christ's words we are 
but failing to make that appear outwardly which we 
have really in the Unseen. And this knowledge; in- 
stead of lulling us into an indifferent sleep regarding 
the manifestation of our heritage, gives us greater con- 
fidence in the words of God, which confidence, fanned 
into a flame by the Holy Spirit, becomes a power 
greater than we should have in a fiery "zeal without 
knowledge." 

For example, "nothing shall be imposible unto you," 
says Christ. Instead of blindly trying to do many 
things, in which we fail, and therefore conclude He did 
not mean what He said, we see His words are abso- 
lutely true. The only question with us is whether we 
have permitted the flesh to be sufficiently crucified to 
manifest its truth in the Seen. There is where the en- 
tire failure lies. 

Or, "Christ hath abolished death," the scripture tells 
us. It is true in the unseen Father's life, but who hai 



124 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 



manifested it in the seen Christ life? And even though 
this should be manifested through the abundant grace 
of God, referred to in another chapter, it is also true 
concerning all who are born of God. And if we are too 
weak in the flesh to manifest it He is bearing the weak- 
ness appearing. We therefore shall not, with the rec- 
ognition of the Father's life in us, even acknowledge 
death as our heritage, nor mourn as though it were a 
fact. But we shall rejoice that there is no death for 
us, notwithstanding that which appears to be death 
hovers about us. It is but the freedom of the body into 
life, as all they who stand before the Father shall 
testify. 

It is therefore merely a question as to whether we 
-shall manifest it by permitting the unseen life within 
us to overcome the human shell now, or whether we 
shall later move out of the shell and leave it behind as 
a decaying body which people call death, while our 
real life moves on into the wholly Unseen. 

And we must remember this "unity*' of our "one 
Lord" within us does not appear in a life of visible 
authority. But just as, upon God's largest scale. His 
final unity shall appear after all rule and authority 
has been eliminated, so in our own individual world 
of the flesh His unity shall not be manifest until we 
have relinquished all rule and authority as imperfect, 
and His love which consumes all opposition takes their 
place. 

It is the life of freedom of self which Christ entered 
perfectly in His crucifixion, through which He drew 
all men unto Him. It is a life which differs from our 
former life of casting out devils, etc., with authority, 
just as His life after His resurrection differed in that 
respect from His life of authority previous to His cru- 
cifixion. 



THE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 125 

It is illustrated in Christ's conversation with Peter 
in Jno. 21:15-17. 

"Lovest thou me more than these?" The Greek word 
is ''agape," or divine love. Peter answered, "Yea Lord, 
thou knowest that I love (Gr. phileo, or human affec- 
tion) thee." Peter was too truthful to pretend a 
higher regard than he had. He remembered his com- 
plete failure in devotion to Christ previously when he 
had been so certain. ''He saith unto him. Feed my 
lambs." 

Again, "Lovest (agape) thou me?" It was as if He 
would once more try Peter, after having entrusted His 
lambs to his care. But Peter only repeated. "Thou 
knowest I love (phileo) thee." And Christ gave him 
a commission for service of a stronger character, "Feed 
my sheep." 

Then He said, "Lovest (phileo) thou me?" It was 
Christ's condescension to fellowship and to entrust 
Peter upon the basis of weak human friendship if 
Peter would not give him agape, or divine love. And 
Peter, instead of melting before Him at this answered 
petulantly, "Lord, thou knowest all things : thou know- 
est I love (phileo) thee." And Christ, instead of re- 
proving, suffered the rebuke in meekness, and repeated 
the commission to "Feed my sheep." 

It showed the Father's heart, which can not fail to 
win, in such renunciation of Self after its crucifixion. 
Nor did He rebuke the heartless words of Thomas who 
felt Christ had deceived him so completely that he 
would not believe anything He might say or do, unless 
he could verify his senses by touching the nail prints 
and the spear wound. Jno. 20:25. It is the Father's 
life of love which so yields Self to all opposition that 
it must be consumed. 



126 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

And the person who lives this life in perfection will 
lower himself to the level of the lowest so that he can 
see as they see, feel as they feel, suffer as they suffer, 
etc. And then with the Father's wisdom he will see 
it all in an understanding that shows perfection in the 
very face of imperfection and failure. And as he leads 
the oppressed one to see they will together rejoice in 
seeing the Father's gentle hand in all that comes. 

To illustrate, the demon of drink had been cast out 
of a man who had been possessed. It had been done 
in the "name of Christ." But his demon-possessed life 
had strewn such wreck and ruin in his family and 
amongst friends that he was now possessed with a 
demon of remorse that drove him almost frantic. It 
seemed impossible to cast out this demon by authority. 
Then he was shown, in God's wisdom and love, what 
a great ministry he had been prepared for amidst 
drunkards, and cast outs such as no one could do except 
one who had gone through the very experience which 
had been his. He saw it, and because God's love was 
in his heart he accepted it gladly and the demon was 
gone. It was consumed by a spirit of God's love which 
made him a minister of blessing and power. 

Again, a woman was tortured by a demon of rebel- 
lion against all human requests. Before they were 
spoken she perceived in her spirit what they were, and 
she assented to them. But immediately upon hearing 
them she rebelled with all her being. Although she 
knew the request was the will of God and had con- 
ceded to them in secret with the Father, the moment 
human lips uttered them she fought against them. 

The demon could not be cast out. Prayer was use- 
less. Then, in God's wisdom and love she was shown, 
as in the former case, where the trouble lay. That 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 127 

she would have no difficulty were she living in heaven 
where spirit speaks to spirit independent of the chan- 
nel of the human senses. She was reminded that she 
is not in heaven and that to receive through the senses 
is God's appointed channel for her while she is upon 
earth. She was shown that the demon was one of 
rebellion, not against individuals as such, but against 
God's appointment for her to hear requests through 
human speech. Also that her difficulty arose from her 
being privileged above many, to hear from God Him- 
self that which persons spoke later. This, instead of 
causing her rebellion, should make her grateful that 
God favors her by so clear a witness of His will for her. 

When she saw this her heart melted in gratefulness 
and love which forever afterwards consumed the de- 
mon of rebellion against human requests. And her 
ability to hear God's voice peculiarly fitted her for a 
ministry of helpfulness too rare indeed amongst wom- 
en. Health and kindness then attended her freedom, 
instead of sickness. Every demon power which is not 
banished at the command of spiritual authority can be 
surely consumed in this way, if one has the Father's 
wisdom and love to do it. 

How peculiarly the Father's life is wholly in the 
Unseen is illustrated in the instances of Christ ap- 
pearing so differently upon various occasions. His 
transformation before Mary, when one moment she 
thought He was the gardener and the next she knew 
Him. And how He was revealed to the disciples as 
they walked toward Emmaus. His appearance to His 
disciples through entering closed doors and then show- 
ing a substantial body. Luke 24 :39. Jno. 20 :26. 

So we must behold and fellowship the Father now. 
We must see and know Him in the tlnseen. Our hope 



128 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

and joy shall not be affected by the Seen, when our 
fellowship is perfect. For then in some things we 
should recognize Him and in others we should not, 
exactly as the disciples did. And when we live with 
Him in the Unseen we need not be surprised if those 
who can not see with us in the Unseen shall at times 
know us perfectly as His blessed children and at other 
times think we are untrue. And then must we bear 
with them in patience and love until their vision also 
can pierce the Unseen, just as our Father has borne 
with us when we loved not His hand in its gentleness 
because our eyes were upon the harshness of the Seen. 
How simple and beautiful it is, then, after all — ^the 
life of Christ in the Father — when our joy is in the 
Unseen. But how confusing and hopeless it is when 
we try to mingle the Unseen with the Seen, as though 
there is something in the latter which is eternal. For 
the Seen is but temporal and only the Unseen is eternal. 
Not a single thing which is seen or recognized through 
the natural senses shall appear when God is "all and 
in all,** and when "we shall see His face." 



CHAPTER VII. 

Not by the sight of the eye, neither the hearing 
of the ear. 

We have both natural and spiritual senses. They 
relate respectively to the world of the Seen and the 
world of the Unseen. 

The natural senses are seeing, hearing, touching, 
tasting, and smelling. All knowledge of things of the 
natural world, upon which impressions, deductions, 
judgments, and reasoning are based, come through the 
natural senses. Smelling is the most sensitive of all, 
"touching" that which is too rare to affect any of the 
other senses. Seeing and hearing are the coarsest, 
although the most comprehensive of all the senses. 
That is, they are always ready for anything, coarse 
or fine, certain or uncertain in their respective spheres, 
and more general knowledge of the natural life comes 
through them than through the other senses. 

These senses were not designed to culminate in their 
use for the natural life, valuable as they are in it. They 
have their fulfillment in corresponding spiritual senses. 
Of the spiritual senses scent, or smell, as in the natu- 
ral, is the highest. It is the sense God loves and em- 
ploys when He receives our praise and worship as a 
''sweet smelling savour." Eph. 5 :2. It is found alto- 
gether in the Unseen, therefore many, many do not 
recognize it, nor consciously employ it. It is the one 
sense which finally reaches the ''one Lord" in our wor- 
ship of Him. It is the one sense through which we 
are enabled to know Him with certainty. 



130 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

God, in His kingdom, has arranged laws whereby 
all knowledge shall lead to knowing Him. And by 
these laws all of the natural senses are destined to con- 
tribute to the spiritual senses. And all of the spiritual 
senses are, in turn, destined to contribute to the one 
spiritual end of knowing Him in the Unseen. 

We know the sense of spiritual scent so little be- 
cause, just as in our view of Christ, we dwell so much 
upon the Seen. Our spiritual knowledge, impressions 
and judgments are formed mostly from what we see 
and hear through the natural senses. These really are 
so coarse, pertaining to spiritual things, that they 
should not form the basis of judgment of spiritual life 
at all. Surprising as this may seem, let it be further 
known that such judgments do not belong to the Christ 
life which we are privileged to live, even in the Seen. 
Therefore how far from having a place in the Father^s 
life in the Unseen ! 

Here indeed is the prophecy concerning Christ : "The 
Spirit of the Lord shall . . . make Him of quick 
understanding (Heb. scent, or smell. See margin), in 
the fear of the Lord : and He shall not judge after the 
sight of His eyes, neither reprove after the hearing 
of His ears: but with righteousness shall He judge 
the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the 
earth.'' Isa. 11:2-4. 

This shows that we need to radically change our 
method of judging the spirituality of those with whom 
we come in contact. For do we not almost invariably 
judge them by what they say or by what we see them 
do? Have not all church divisions and all disputes 
about spiritual things arisen through such judgments? 
And how often as the years passed on, have we looked 
back to see there was really no cause for the quarrel? 



TEE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 131 

This fact is too significant to be ignored in the pres- 
ence of the scripture which describes Christ's method 
of judging. Truly, however, His method of judgment 
during His life in the Seen was according to the life 
of the Father in the Unseen. Therefore, unless we can 
follow Him had we better not refrain from all spiritual 
judgment? Is it not to us who are not able to judge 
after His manner that He says, 

** Judge not that ye be not judged. For with what 
judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged." Matt. 7:1, 2. 
That is, when we judge by appearance we judge 
wrongly. And if we do not wish to be judged wrongly 
we should be considerate enough to not judge others. 

But when we are able to judge as He judged, as we 
live Christ, in the flesh, our judgment will be profitable. 
For then we may follow His example and *Vith right- 
eousness . . . judge the poor, and reprove with 
equity for the meek of the earth." To us He then 
says, "Judge not according to appearance, but judge 
righteous judgment." Jno. 7 :24. It now becomes our 
duty to do it. For the *'poor" and ''the meek of the 
earth" are continually set aside by those who judge 
by what they see and hear, whereas they are often the 
most precious in the Father's sight because of the 
savour of their lives ascending to Him in worship and 
praise. The sensitiveness of the Spirit is rudely thrust 
aside and the work of the Lord crippled in His ''Body," 
the church, when we judge by senses too coarse to be 
considered. We ignore the very sense that was used 
by Christ, and therefore fail to perceive the needs of 
the "poor" and the "meek," which are cast out by this 
world ! 

It is through the sense of spiritual scent that we 
know when we come into "touch" with God. Through 



132 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

the other senses there is more or less doubt about this. 
Not always can we "see" Him everywhere and in every- 
thing before us. Not always can we "hear"His voice. 
Not always ''feel" His arms under us when they are. 
Not always ''taste'* that our Lord is good in whatever 
comes. But always, in prayer to Him, when self is 
out of the way do we receive and recognize His Pres- 
ence. His blessed comfort comes as an atmosphere 
into our lives, from whence we know not, nor how nor 
why. 

We cannot possibly analyze or locate it as we can 
the impressions of the other spiritual senses. It is 
Him, we know, and He brings comfort more sweet 
than the perfume of many gardens. And the more we 
perceive the likeness of "touching" Him through this 
sense, to the "touch" with which we come into an unde- 
finable joy and pleasure of Nature's perfection in 
scented atmosphere, the better we understand why He 
speaks of our right prayers from hearts beautiful in 
humility as a "sweet smell." And why this was sym- 
bolized in the days of old by the burning of incense 
sweet and holy unto the Lord. Ex. 30:34-38. 

After we have learned to definitely "sense" our 
Lord's presence in this unmistakable manner, we may 
hope to "sense" the spiritual life in our brother or sis- 
ter by the same token. The spiritual "touch" is pre- 
cisely the same. For God's eternal life in them is the 
same as that life within Himself. Then why should 
we not experience the same sensation of soul as we do 
in spiritual touch with Him ? 

We may do it. The touch will be weaker than toward 
God because their spiritual life is so much smaller than 
what we touch of God. And we may at first be able to 
consciously "touch" the life in only those who are spir- 



THE INFINITEr^N TRINITY AND UNITY 133 

itually strong. But the sense may be cultivated. It is 
cultivated by acknowledging in faith God's life in all 
who accept Him, and hopefully anticipating coming 
into touch with the life in them as in Him. And its 
cultivation may reach that sensitiveness whereby we 
are able to "sense*' that of God in every person which 
makes it possible for him to believe in God, even before 
spiritual life has been consciously born in him from 
heaven. It is this sense which enables the soul winner 
to confidently know a person is going to be a chosen 
vessel in the Lord's service when others see in him 
only an angry and hopeless devil. He may call it faith, 
or a "witness of the Spirit," but it is through the sense 
of spiritual scent that it is known. For through this 
sense the life of God, wherever it may be, knows God's 
life wherever else it may be. 

And so certain is the judgment through this sense 
that the judgment of all of the other spiritual and natu- 
ral senses combined can not change it when we are 
true to God. When they, however, combine with it as 
much as possible in its "righteous judgment," they con- 
tribute to both its joy and usefulness in serving one's 
fellow men in the pure love of God. The other senses 
in this way rally to this one spiritual sense in knowing 
spiritual life. And they also become useful in impart- 
ing spiritual blessings to others. Of themselves, how- 
ever, none of them receive certain knowledge by which 
to judge spiritual life in others nor do they form cer- 
tain channels whereby to impart spiritual blessings to 
others. 

For example, through the sense of sight, we behold 
the works of God in a man's deeds. We therefore judge 
him to be a child of God. And yet this sense is not 
wholly reliable, as one may do God's works of casting 



134 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 



out devils, etc., without knowing God. See Matt. 7 :22. 
Or, when we hear him confess his belief in God through 
Jesus Christ, the scriptures require us to recognize 
him as a child of God. 1 Cor. 12:3. 1 Jno. 5:1. But 
we do this by faith and not wholly from the sense of 
hearing. For the very next day we may hear him 
deny God. Employing the sense of touch, said Jehu 
to Jehonidab, "Is thine heart right, as my heart is 
with thy heart?" And Jehonidab answered, "It is." 
"If it be, give me thine hand." And he gave him his 
hand : and he took him up into his chariot. And he said, 
"Come with me and see my zeal for the Lord." 2 King 
10:15, 16. But because the flesh is so ready to spring 
up between some temperaments and to shrink back 
between others, touch is not a certain index always to 
spiritual life. 

The sense of taste for the same spiritual food is an 
index of likeness of spirit between two or more per- 
sons. But minds also run together in intellectual tastes 
in such a way that we can not always discern between 
the mind and the spirit sensing the "taste" of what 
is received. 

In the sense of scent it is different. It senses the 
atmosphere of a spiritual presence as the fragrance of 
incense with the uplift of ozone. It is the touch of 
life through the Holy Spirit, such as God loves to 
sense. The spiritual (not animal) atmosphere between 
two or more is never deceptive nor indifferent when 
we are sensitive to it. The nearest natural approach 
to it is intuition. When another's presence is as aroma 
or strength, good to one's soul, we need not fear to 
trust the sensation. Between us there is perfect love 
which casteth out fear. They are a boon to us akin 
to the presence of God. For indeed it is His life in 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 135 

them we sense. It is the same kind of a "witness of 
the Spirit" which speaks to us from God making us 
conscious we are His children. It is now "witnessing" 
between His children. This is the more pronounced 
when the life of God in both is strong, or the channel 
between two is clear of the flesh. 

If, however, the presence of a person is uncanny or 
makes us shudder or turn aside in aversion or fear, it 
is a certain index of either a lack of unity, or of recep- 
tiveness of spirit, regardless of words or appearances. 
We shall turn from them quickly as from inhaling 
poison, until love can change the spirit or bring about 
receptiveness. There could not have been two church 
sects formed, each worshipping God, had the spirits 
been tried in this way. For uncanny spirits do not 
unite in worship of God. 

In imparting spiritual help and strength to others 
there is the same lack of certainty of giving blessings, 
by way of the senses. The light of one's eye may give 
out only love, but through prejudice or evil judgment 
it may be received in hatred instead. Or one may point 
out the road of life clearly to another one, but through 
eyes focused differently from the different environ- 
ments of life it may become a maze instead of a plain 
path. Or through the tone of voice one may speak 
spiritual things tenderly and they are received harshly, 
depending upon the attitude of the hearer. Or words 
may be spoken plainly and a swift and corrupt imag- 
ination may hear that which was not spoken at all, or 
fail to hear that which was said. 

The touch of the hand will surely impart only spir- 
itual help from a spirit-filled person to the one seeking 
it. But to the one whose flesh is crying out the flesh 
only may be awakened. Thus the laying on of hands, 



136 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

even when done with the highest natural motive, may 
become either a blessing or a curse, depending upon the 
desires of the one receiving the touch. Therefore Paul 
says, **Lay hands suddenly on no man, neither be par- 
takers of other men's sins : keep thyself pure." 1 Tim. 
5:22. 

We dare not do it, except in earnest prayer, or com- 
manding faith. When they are seeking the desires of 
the flesh we become partakers of their sins, by quick- 
ening their flesh. Not necessarily fleshly passions, but 
doubts, natural inclinations, fears, or desires of the 
mind, etc. Probably every handshake which is prompt- 
ed by the flesh alone, quickens the flesh, though we 
may be unconscious of it because it is so subtle. 

In spiritual taste we may, by instruction, influence, 
or environment, impart spiritual food and strength to 
others. Then again, all our best natural efforts may 
minister only to their flesh, depending wholly upon 
whether they receive with a heart reaching out for 
God, or with their desires bent upon feeding the in- 
tellect only. If the latter, we strengthen their flesh. 
Christ's wisdom in teaching was shown when He some- 
times coupled hard sayings with beautiful invitations. 
Those who followed Him in the flesh were turned away 
because of it. 

But when we emit spiritual strength In the sweet 
atmosphere of our presence, or send it to the ends of 
the earth in prayer as we live close to God, absolutely 
no harm can result; but only good, regardless of the 
attitude of those upon whom our incense falls. Even 
the flesh may be quickened Godward by it, while those 
whose hearts hunger for God, and who come where 
they may inhale it are blessed immeasurably, though 
not a touch be given or any instruction be imparted. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 137 

This is therefore the one sense which may be used 
without fear and with universal profit. So certain is 
it and so pleasing to God always that, just as one looks 
hopefully and quietly to Him to fill one's cup with in- 
cense, He sends the supply from heaven in a constant 
stream. It is to be breathed out to others in blessings 
of health, prosperity, and a greater and richer salva- 
tion, as one's life becomes a prayer for them and not 
for self. And as it is received freely by them the 
overflow covers and fills the giver, blessing him more 
than he could have asked for himself. 

The other senses are therefore valuable, not in know- 
ing and gauging the spiritual life in others, or in know- 
ing God, but in accepting that life by faith. Also in 
perceiving the bondage to the flesh, of spiritual life 
in ourselves and others. For when we see, hear, feel, 
or taste of God's blessings without sensing in spirit. 
His approval, we know there is bondage of the flesh 
somewhere. And in their proper use we may greatly 
enjoy our life in the flesh, but not of the flesh. As we 
use the senses with bowels and heart yearning for 
God's best in ourselves and in others, they are being 
used properly and to God's glory. In some way we do 
not understand they contribute to a more full and 
sensitive "savour of a sweet smell" in touch with God's 
life in Himself and in His children. 

There is not a good and right thing in this world 
but what is ours to use in that spirit. The strenuous- 
ness of life, instead of becoming greater when one has 
a mind to use every sense to lead him Godward con- 
stantly, passes entirely away in a freedom as of little 
children. Recreation as well as work may then rightly 
become a part of our life. And if we are able to hear 
the leading of the Holy Spirit our occupations will have 



138 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

a roundness and fullness which satisfies, and prevents 
all strain and strife. 

For when we come into spiritual touch with God's 
life in others similar to our "touch" with Him why 
should there not be the same quieting and strength- 
ening result? We must remember, however, that when 
the spiritual touch with our fellows is strong we may 
think we have God's highest leadings when it is not so. 
It is merely His highest in the ideal of our friend. Much 
"unity of the spirit'* is but all yielding to the highest 
conception of God present in the group. And when one 
enters the group with a higher conception of God he 
will be rejected if self in the others is permitted to rule. 
God Himself would be rejected upon the same grounds. 

So seductive is self that it clings to the "touch" of 
God's life in others in the face of many leadings God 
brings before us to lift us into His higher ways. Hence 
we refuse to advance until we are really forced up- 
wards, when self rules. It is the one who is open to 
God's higher leadings independent of God in his as- 
sociates who advances rapidly into God's fulness. 

So the conclusion of this chapter is: do not judge 
spiritual life which can not be seen, by the senses which 
have to do with the Seen. If we would have right judg- 
ments do not mix the Seen and the Unseen. Let there 
be certainty in judgment only in the Unseen. 



CHAPTER VIII. 
"Neither do I condemn thee." 

As a matter of spiritual philosophy, interpreting the 
spirit rather than the text of scriptural narratives, 
the subject of the previous chapter is most important. 

Beneath the natural senses lies a natural life seeking 
impression and expression. For this the senses form 
the natural channel. This life is called the flesh, or 
natural man, which includes the mind in all of its 
attributes, as well as the impulses and passions. God 
does not want the flesh, as a being, destroyed. If pos- 
sessed of a devil He wants the devil cast out of it. But 
He no more teaches us to cast out the natural man, as 
an entity which exists, than He does that we shall am- 
putate a limb unnecessarily. To do it would be suicide. 
What He wants is the flesh crucified and turned over 
to His use, and made alive in the Spirit, just as He 
wants His health in the limb, that it may walk with 
Him. It is not then the old self, or ego, but God in the 
ego, received through His precious life blood in Christ. 

God then dwells within the natural man. The new 
life is different from the old, but it must give expres- 
sion through the old channel of the flesh. In order 
that this may be possible one must first renounce the 
old fleshly way, and the very tendency of the flesh 
which naturally inclines to manifest itself as before, 
must be destroyed. This is called self -crucifixion. Only 
in proportion to the crucifixion of self in any way or 
degree can God's life express Himself. It is God's will 
to express Himself through every attribute and power 



140 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

of the natural man, and in order to permit this, self 
must be crucified continually and persistently until 
God has full right of way via the old channel of the 
senses. 

That is, the former habit of looking with the eyes 
to gain advantages for self shall be renounced and 
crucified, and instead one shall look for ways to bless 
others as prompted by God's life within. Or the habit 
of hearing for self shall be similarly changed into the 
habit of hearing for the good of others. With the other 
senses it is the same. In this manner all of the many, 
many impressions received for, and the manifestations 
given of, self through the senses, shall be displaced by 
impressions or manifestations for others, in the spirit 
of God's life. 

Considering that, in all of this, the life of God in 
one uses the very channels of expression which gave 
individuality to the natural man, we can readily see 
that each person's individuality in the spiritual life, or 
his differentiation from other lives born of God, is 
dependent largely upon two considerations. First, 
upon the individuality of the natural man before he 
became spiritual. Second, upon the extent, and pecu- 
liar line, of the crucifixion which he permits self to 
bear. 

Except for these we should all perhaps be exactly 
alike in heaven because of our lives being purely spir- 
itual there, and the Spirit being that of the one God. 
And because many who are saved through belief in the 
Savior permit little crucifixion of self, and consequent 
6vercoming by God's life within them, there will doubt- 
less be a great multitude with little spiritual individu- 
ality, amongst whom they who have overcome the life 
of the flesh while upon earth, through the life of the 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 141 

Spirit, "shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, 
and ... as the stars forever and ever." Dan. 
12:3. 

As previously noted, however, because the channels 
of expression or impression through all of the senses 
but that of spiritual scent may be warped, none but 
the latter is dependable for the Spirit's use under all 
circumstances, in knowing spiritual life. And because 
of this the other senses are made to contribute to this 
one and enrich its use when they are properly directed. 
Every attribute of the flesh may in this way be turned 
over to the Spirit's use, as the flesh becomes crucified 
in respect to self. 

Indeed so careful is God to preserve the flesh to this 
very end — to grow into spiritual life — that if any cer- 
tain tendency of the flesh is renounced and crucified, 
but not quickened into spiritual service, the flesh mani- 
fests itself equally strong in some other tendency at 
the first opportunity. 

To illustrate: A person is harassed with care and 
anxiety through poverty or hard lines. The care and 
anxiety is of the flesh. Suddenly they come into riches 
and freedom of responsibility and readily renounce and 
"crucify" the former tendencies of the flesh. But un- 
less the life of God controls in that which is renounced 
and crucified, the flesh rules in selfishness or in dissi- 
pation. Therefore it is only when turned into God's 
service in the Spirit that one's flesh is really overcome 
at all. 

Christ has indeed overcome Satan in the flesh and in 
every other way, and we have the Christ life within ua. 
But through all of the other senses Satan will deceive 
us and make us believe at times that he has not been 
overcome. Through the sense of spiritual scent alone 



142 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

may we have sufficient confidence or faith in God that 
we know, regardless of everything to the contrary, that 
Satan is powerless. Hence the wisdom of our using all 
of the other senses to contribute to the perfect use of 
this one, well pleasing to God. 

That we may at least apprehend the mystery of spir- 
itual sight, hearing, feeling, and taste, uniting with 
spiritual scent, we shall notice a simplicity and union 
of the natural senses which may suggest a like simplic- 
ity in the spiritual. For in the natural we see that im- 
pressions are received and expressions given through 
the senses by one common expression — ^that of touch. 
Touch of the retina, the auditory nerves, the skin, the 
tongue, or the olfactory nerves. We notice also that the 
possibilities of perfect "touch" in the highest of the 
natural senses are indicated by the sensitiveness of 
either of the other senses, and the strength of the na- 
ture back of each. As noticed later this may be more 
prominently manifest through the sense of feeling 
than through the other senses, albeit a close analysis 
may disclose that, unless physically impaired, one of 
the group is an index to the sensitiveness and strength 
of each of the others. 

For instance, a warm, delicate, appreciative touch 
of the body signifies a corresponding nature in the 
background, and also a warm, delicate appreciation of 
external things through the other senses. There is also 
a capability of imparting to others impressions through 
the senses accordingly. A cold, indifferent, shrinking 
touch signifies a like nature back of it, and a similar 
indifference through the other senses. There is also 
inability to impart warmth and appreciation to others 
through the senses. Though there be exceptions, this 
is the rule. 



TEE INFINITM, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 143 

What follows Godward, from these facts, is that the 
former person is able to come into spiritual touch 
with God in prevailing prayer in a way that is impos- 
sible to the latter. Therefore his spiritual ministry 
while he is in the flesh may far exceed the ministry of 
the latter, when both alike have their hearts fixed upon 
God. 

Thus it is that God sees greater possibilities in His 
service, of the one who is endowed with a warm, re- 
sponsive nature, though expressing itself in the animal 
form of the senses, than of one who is lacking in 
warmth or in the free expression of his nature through 
the senses, although less of the animal is apparent in 
the latter. For He knows the former is a vessel well 
fitted for His use when once the natural inclinations 
and expressions are turned into spiritual. And He 
knows that the lowest of the fleshly nature, when cru- 
cified, and its channel of expression is turned into the 
spiritual, may unite with the purest in the person in 
becoming a "sweet smelling savour" unto Him, and 
in doing His service in the world. 

That is, that a deep, responsive nature, with rich 
physical life, quivering to touch and be touched in the 
natural, when transformed into His image, can receive 
and impart through the sense of natural touch, spir- 
itual blessings such as are impossible to a cold, unre- 
sponsive nature, though the one possessing the latter 
be as earnest in His service as the other. And that this 
normal calling for natural touch, instead of needing 
condemnation, really signifies capabilities of the high- 
est sense of touch in the Spirit, or spiritual scent, such 
as the other one can not exercise so fully. God is not 
partial in distributing natures with special capabili- 
ties in this way to some, and withholding from others, 



144 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

as at first sight might appear. We note later how all 
may receive the nature He loves to bless with His 
power and ministry, be their natural endowments 
what they may. 

It is doubtless because of these facts that God has 
so often passed by with comparative lightness, sins 
which we count so grievous and almost unforgivable. 
For He sees the possibilities of the nature which led 
to these particular sins, once they were turned to Him, 
as He well knew they should be if they knew Him. Thus 
it was that a harlot, and for her sake her near rela- 
tives, was favored above all others when Jericho was 
destroyed. And that David, notwithstanding his sin 
of the passions which led to murder, was called a man 
after God's own heart. And that a son of his stolen 
wife formed one of the line of Christ's ancestors. And 
that the lovers of wine were not condemned for it. 
Deut. 14 :26. And that harlots should go into the king- 
dom of heaven in preference to moral, but unbelieving 
and unresponsive Jews. Matt. 21 :31. And that Christ 
had no condemnation for the woman taken in adultery, 
the sinner who washed His feet with her tears, and the 
one of ill fame at Jacob's well. 

For it is a strong, warm, responsive nature overrid- 
ing many obstacles of environment, opinion, and intui- 
tion, which usually leads to these sins, and, in the ab- 
sence of obstacles, to natural expression without sin. 
And this very call of the flesh from normal affection, 
when turned, first, to spiritual desire and thence into 
the highest touch of spiritual life in other people and 
in God, becomes finally an expression that is indeed a 
sweet savour to them and to Him. 

In this transformation the joy through spiritual 
scent is unequaled by any other experience while we 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 145 

are in the flesh. In it there is both the rapture of 
bringing souls into the kingdom of God and the satis- 
faction of imparting spiritual life and strength to 
others. Moreover, this sense may be exercised con- 
tinually by men in conjunction with the other senses, 
in which physical desire is consumed in the life of 
God's holy fire, and responsively by women in holy 
obedience to the will of such men. For woman is de- 
pendent in spirit upon man, even in apparent indepen- 
dence of deed. We are but upon the merest verge of 
our spiritual possibilities, as will appear in the chap- 
ter following. 

God does delight in such natures. It is inordinate 
affection and the perversion of the senses which He 
condemns. And even where He does not condemn 
where we think He might. He doubtless perceives that, 
could the ones but know the higher sphere of the affec- 
tions and the senses expressing them, they would enter 
with a whole heart into it, spurning the lower. And 
He looks upon the heart. 

When we have God's perception of full, rich, respon- 
sive natures, and the love and wisdom to lead such into 
their very highest use, how our hearts will go out with 
His to harlots, though they have chosen the life, and 
to drunkards, indulgent of themselves and others in 
great generosity. For it is a field of crime and misery 
where lovely women and stalwart men sink noble na- 
tures and talents as in no other place. Many of these 
have natures with strong callings which can never be 
satisfied except in the highest experiences and touch 
of spiritual life. They are conscious of a cry for some- 
thing they have never reached, either in their lusts or 
in their periods of conversion to God and enjoyment 
in His worship. 



146 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

Many have been as thoroughly converted as hosts 
of others who are standing firm. But they did not, 
intelligently, reach that plane of spiritual life and 
touch with God and their fellow man, which knows no 
sex in its enjoyment, or which is greater than intoxi- 
cation from spirits. It is for them if they close their 
eyes and ears and use these and the other senses in 
their highest form. And though many have gone be- 
yond the power of grasping it, in their debauchery 
and their perversion of the natural senses, the few who 
may be reached, and the many who may be turned in 
bright hope from entering the broad way, to whom it 
is appealing insidiously, shall become channels of 
God's blessings surpassing many others. 

In confirmation of these possibilities let it be re- 
flected that there are few men or women of great spir- 
itual power with God and their fellow men but have 
been, or are, very susceptible to the affections or to 
the sense of touch in its lower animal form, if they 
but give way to them. And that it is owing to their 
environments or training or some restraint for which 
they were not responsible that they are in spiritual 
work rather than in fields of sin and shame. 

The lower use of the other senses is also displeasing 
to God. For instance, the spiritual sense of taste is 
abused when one chooses to feed the mind, or intellect, 
rather than the spirit within themselves. It leads to 
headiness, self will, and self -righteousness. The sense 
of sight is abused when it gloats over personal desires 
or possessions, instead of worshipping God because He 
made things beautiful and desirable. It leads to avar- 
ice and covetousness. The sense of hearing is abused 
in listening for one's personal advantage or for the 
degradation of others, instead of hearing God's voice 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 147 

in all things and circumstances. It leads to wrong 
judgments, suspicionings, and idle gossip. And the 
sense of spiritual scent is abused when one's delight 
is centered in personal magnetism in himself or others. 
For it directs one's mind to self and the powers of 
self, rather than upon God as our constant source of 
power and life, above and about us. It leads into 
spiritualism, occultism, and psychic pov/ers, compre- 
hended in ancient Bible times under the head of witch- 
ery and familiar spirits, which were universally con- 
demned. See 2 Chron. 33 :6. Isa. 8 :19. 

There is not a good thing in either of these but may 
be had in the higher use of the senses. And power 
is limited in the lower, while in the higher there is 
absolutely no limit except our capacity or willingness 
to enter what God has for us. It is not God's will that 
the use of any of the senses shall be eliminated as an 
enemy to spiritual enjoyment. But it is His highest 
will that the natural enjoyment of them all shall be 
transformed into spiritual enjoyment. And this shall 
be not only spiritual enjoyment in our fellowship with 
Him, but with persons of like precious faith with us. 

For indeed this possibility of a richer and more sen- 
sible spiritual touch with God in proportion to one's 
susceptibility to the touch of the senses, has its counter- 
part in the possibility of children of God coming into 
spiritual touch with one another. That is, the more 
pleasing the sensation of feeling in the touch of an- 
other person, the greater are the possibilities of joy 
and fulness in their spiritual touch. Natural touch 
does not cultivate spiritual touch in such instances, 
but if indulged in for mere pleasure it retards the 
spiritual. But pleasure in the natural indicates that 
there is for us more perfect spiritual touch than we 



148 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

have hitherto experienced. When we touch in the 
natural with that hope the higher touch may be quick- 
ened and the lower passes away in attractiveness in 
the conversion finally of natural into the higher pleas- 
ure of spiritual touch. 

It is precisely the same with all of the senses. For 
instance, in the hearing of a song, when beneath the 
pleasing voice the singer has the baptism of the Holy 
Ghost in a heart reaching out after souls, there is 
power which quickens and converts to God. And it is 
the most pleasing song in the world to those who re- 
ceive it in the spirit, while to others it may be very 
commonplace. 

It is owing to the same law that, when two are out 
of harmony with each other in spiritual life, there is 
little or no pleasure in a handshake, or touch of the 
skin. Nor is there favor through any of the other 
senses. There may be aversion through them all. 

If touch were pleasing it would indicate a still 
greater spiritual touch with one another than is being 
experienced. But since this is impossible, nature, in 
true harmony with her mission to contribute to the 
spiritual, refuses to permit pleasure in natural touch. 
Open the way for delightful spiritual touch and see 
how quickly nature advertises the possibility of the 
spiritual by bringing pleasure into the natural touch! 
She is never asleep and never a laggard. It is our 
spiritual possibilities which are asleep and Nature 
shuts her eyes until we have waked from our slumber. 

If but one of two persons have shut off the possibil- 
ity of greater spiritual touch from the other one, but 
they themselves may touch the other one still more, 
natural touch may be pleasing to them while it is an 
aversion to the other. This is likely to be the case 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 149 

where the first one is criticising the other but sincerely- 
condemning themselves for it. They are unwilling 
critics and heartily wish it were otherwise. This un- 
willingness is, at heart, approval of the other one and 
therefore nature beckons them to a closer spiritual 
union. The one who is criticised, however, is under 
condemnation, knowingly or ignorantly, so that greater 
spiritual touch is almost impossible, therefore the ab- 
sence of attraction in the natural senses. 

This same law operates between us and God. When 
there is possible greater spiritual touch with Him than 
we are now enjoying we take pleasure in the enjoy- 
ment of His creation through the natural senses. We 
do not love the world then but because we love Him the 
world appears beautiful. And He then enjoys the 
works of our hands, the praise of our lips, etc., ex- 
pressed through the natural senses. There is joy be- 
tween us both in the things which are seen. But when 
we criticise Him or grumble or complain, it is different. 
We indeed enjoy the things of His creation through 
the natural senses, for at least we love Him and do not 
wish to criticise. So Nature, in the depths of our 
heart, sees the possibility of greater spiritual touch 
with God, and permits us pleasure through the natural 
senses. But God takes little or no pleasure in us then. 
Instead He says, 

"I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor 
hot : I would that thou wert cold or hot. So then be- 
cause thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I 
will spue thee out of my mouth." ''I counsel thee to 
buy of me gold tried in the fire that thou mayest be 
rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, 
and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; 
and anoint thine eyes with eye salve, that thou mayest 



150 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten (which 
caused us to grumble and criticise) : be zealous there- 
fore, and repent." Rev. 3 :16, 18, 19. Immediately He 
will then take pleasure in all of our works. 

Inasmuch as the absence of attractiveness between 
two or more persons through the natural senses sig- 
nifies, except in the very highest spiritual union pos- 
sible, real hindrances to greater spiritual touch, the 
indulgence of any of the senses until its "touch" is sat- 
isfied or satiated, that no more is wanted of it, thereby 
prevents greater spiritual touch than has been experi- 
enced. This is indicated by the satisfying of the natu- 
ral. And because it precludes larger spiritual touch 
between persons we may readily know it hinders a 
larger spiritual touch with God while this satiated con- 
dition lasts. Hence it is that men were not allowed, 
under the Mosaic law, to attempt to approach God 
until a period after a certain sense had been satisfied 
between two. See Lev. 15 :16, 18. Also Ex. 19 :15. It 
would have been useless and a mockery to try to come 
into spiritual touch with God immediately, no matter 
how holy the deed. The same rule follows the complete 
satisfaction of any of the senses, although in none of 
the others is this so marked as in the sense of feeling. 

And so the satisfying unto satiation, of any of the 
natural senses is wrong, between two or more. Or, 
rather, in their holiest use it is not God's ideal for 
them, as appears in the next chapter. See 1 Cor. 7 :37, 
38. For then spiritual touch with one another and 
with God is curtailed in power, and man immediately 
ceases to advance.* 

*God did not institute marriage. He sanctioned it conditionally after 
the first pair had "married" themselves, as appears later. See Gen. 3 :16. 
1 Cor. 7 :28. 1 Tim. 2 :15. But He forbade them reaching the highest 
blessings through it. Gen. 3 :22, 23. The blessings of the "tree of life" 
are for either through Christ, who did not marry. 



THE INFINITM, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 151 

There is the same law pertaining to one's own pleas- 
ure in his natural self through any or all of the senses. 
They may be regarded and enjoyed according to this 
same law of the senses and spiritual life. That is, such 
pleasure is an index that there is greater spiritual 
pleasure in a larger touch with God. For touch with 
God enlarges with the conversion of the natural into 
the spiritual. The natural pleasure of the senses may, 
in this constant hope, be made to contribute to growth 
in the spiritual. 

For instance, pleasure in hearing music may hold a 
hope of greater touch with God's voice and His har- 
mony. Pleasure in a home may in this hope rivet the 
greater beauty of the heavenly home in our conscious- 
ness. Love of parents, friends, or children should in- 
telligently lure us into a larger love of like spiritual 
relations. A good appetite gives us assurance of greater 
enjoyment in the taste of the things of the Spirit. And 
thus the conversion may go on indefinitely. 

Until the flesh in a person has been overcome in all 
ways, the fact of susceptibility to pleasure through 
the senses should not be looked upon as a snare, but, 
rather, as a beacon light to press on into greater things 
in the spiritual. For this is its assurance. When fi- 
nally the flesh has been overcome, not satiated, so that 
one wants none of it in any way, but turns from every 
feature of it, his discipleship in Christ is complete. 
This is the final ideal of overcoming in "hating" one's 
''father and mother, and wife, and children, and breth- 
ren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also." Luke 
14:26. 

When we see how kindly God seeks to lead us to Him, 
by giving us pleasure through the senses long before 
we think of this having any relation to spiritual enjoy- 



152 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

ment, does it not illustrate methods we should follow 
in winning life in the natural to life in the spiritual, 
or worldly souls into His salvation ? Does it not prove 
to us that any way to please the natural man or woman 
through their senses, which is right, and when our 
secret motive is to lead them into spiritual pleasure in 
God's salvation, is in perfect divine order? Does it 
not explain to us why God so beautifully smiles upon 
the ministry of many of His servants who are soul 
winners, but whose efforts seem to us who are of a 
different temperament, to be **in the flesh," as we say? 

Truly they are "in the flesh" but not of the flesh. 
And as persons are attracted to them through having 
their flesh pleased, the constant, secret aim of the 
servant of God to lead them to Him for their final 
pleasure at last prevails. We judge him from his 
external manifestations, and probably condemn. God 
sees his heart and honors his labors. Therefore how 
fitting the admonition of the Word : 

"Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? 
To his own master he standeth or f alleth. Yea, he shall 
be holden up : for God is able to make him to stand." 
Rom. 14 :4. "Therefore judge nothing before the time, 
until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the 
hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the 
counsels of the heart: and then shall every man have 
praise of God." 1 Cor. 4:5. 

And yet how universal it is to judge the minister of 
God unless his method of winning souls appeals to our 
notions of "spirituality" which is often only self-ality. 
And instead of his being permitted to throw all of his 
living force into reaching souls in his own natural, 
God-given way of appealing through their senses, he 
must curb his freest channel of expression and hobble 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 153 

himself with those of other persons who would pass 
judgment upon his own. The result of this custom 
amongst the children of the Lord has often been to 
either drive men of exceptional power in the Holy 
Ghost from an active ministry or to mould them into 
an activity which was not God's ideal for them in use- 
fulness, nor the service of greatest joy in their Lord. 

So much is the spirit of the church of our Lord Jesus 
Christ under the dominion of social ideas and customs 
that she will condemn rather than uphold the man or 
woman of broad spiritual conception who dares to fol- 
low a fixed determination to win souls to eternal life 
at any cost. For instance, in order to reach all classes 
he will be willing to lose his reputation in society. 
Even the church which has the grace of God to stand 
by him in ordinary efforts among the cast outs, will 
scarcely approve when he follows methods which class 
him as one with those who live in dissipation and 
shame. 

And yet that was the very life of our Master. They 
said, "Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a 
friend of pubhcans and sinners." Luke 7:34. How 
few spiritual leaders have the courage of familiarity 
with those of evil repute such as Christ had with the 
woman at the well and with the one who ministered 
to Him in Simon's house? And yet nothing less may 
win them. Where are the Lord's people who will up- 
hold His servants who count no cost of reputation too 
great for that? Who will close their eyes and ears in 
judgment and discern their true spirit and the favor 
of God in them through spiritual scent alone? 

Who, instead of cautioning and holding them back 
lest they lose influence among persons higher in so- 
ciety, or lest they fall into error themselves, give them 



154 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

Godspeed, holding them firm and safe before their 
Lord who is able to bless their ministry and to keep 
them from falling? Indeed, is not the church respon- 
sible for hotbeds of shame and corruption because of 
her judgment by the eye and ear in condemnation, 
instead of her spiritual perception of the life in her 
servants which can not lose hold upon God, nor fail 
in saving others, when supported in faith by their 
brethren? Is not the church more anxious for her 
own reputation than for the power of God to overcome 
all evil? 



CHAPTER IX. 
"Nothing shall be impossible to you." 

In full harmony with the law that complete satisfac- 
tion of the natural senses prevents greater spiritual 
touch with God, was the prohibition of Adam and Eve 
of an indulgence which should result in that condition. 
For the satisfaction of one sense to that degree should 
prevent a spiritual touch with God such as would give 
them Godlike power. That spiritual touch was pos- 
sible then. They had been commanded to "be fruitful 
and multiply." Gen. 1:28. This command, however, 
was to the spiritual life and not to the natural. God 
speaks to the spiritual in a man, and not to the natural 
though it be through the natural. 

There was this dual nature in man from his begin- 
ning. When God breathed into man's nostrils "the 
breath of life and man became a living soul" (Gen. 2 : 
7) it was the breath of God's own spiritual life pul- 
sating thereafter in the natural or soul life of the man, 
making it a soul "living" in touch with God. It was 
this higher life which received the command to mul- 
tiply. For, as said, that is the life God speaks to, 
whether the impression reaches us through the natural 
senses or otherwise. And it was the lower life which 
was, in the symbolic account, warned against satisfied 
indulgence of any of the natural senses, lest touch with 
God be broken. For then man should immediately 
reach a standstill, which should be death, or separa- 
tion from God. 

God does not cease to advance for a single moment, 



156 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

even when He "rests." The man who ceases to try 
to advance with Him separates himself, during the 
period, from God's spiritual touch and a greater spir- 
itual touch with his fellow disciple, whether or not he 
is conscious of it. 

If any should doubt the possibility or desirability 
upon God's part, of man having such spiritual touch 
with God at the first as to produce spiritual offspring 
independent of the natural senses, they should reflect 
upon the power he now has according to the good will 
of God, notwithstanding the vitiation of his spiritual 
life through sin. 

This power and God's will was illustrated when a 
man, with no strength in his ankles from his birth so 
that he had to be carried about as a child, was imme- 
diately, at the command of Peter, given life in his feet 
and he ran and leaped in perfect health. Acts 3:1-8. 
If new life from coming into spiritual touch with God, 
could thus come into drawn and shrunken tissue and 
bones why should it not more easily have taken form 
in a healthy body consecrated to the Lord, at the mere 
desire of the first pair? 

Again, the disciples were commanded not only to 
heal the sick but to ''raise the dead" as well. Matt. 
10:8. And if their spiritual touch with God was such 
that at their command life should enter a diseased, 
dead body of flesh, is it strange that man should at 
first have had power to come into such spiritual touch 
with Him, that the life germ should have entered a 
body perfectly fitted and set apart for it? 

The one is no more unreasonable than the other. Or 
if so, the possibilities are decidedly in favor of the 
second instances in each query. Is it not so? And if 
it is objected that miracles of the kind referred to by 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 157 

the apostles are wholly in the remote past, there is 
ample evidence that can not be disputed, to the con- 
trary. Such things are not unusual even in these days. 
In fact they cause little comment amongst those who 
are informed, although they are far from being uni- 
versal in answer to the prayer or command of faith. 

But perfectly new lungs are indicated an hour after 
they had been all but gone. New flesh forms almost 
instantly where there had been putrid and painful can- 
cers. Shrunken tissues are made to round out and 
pulsate with life they never had before. Eyes with 
lifeless sight from birth are filled with life which sees. 
Many of these are in the flesh of those who doubt 
God's power and the truth of His promises, and the 
life is received through men coming into spiritual 
touch with God in behalf of the afflicted. Should man 
in close fellowship with God not more readily have 
had power to bring God's own pulsating life into a 
healthy body in the beginning by merely coming into 
touch with His spiritual life in that behalf? 

And there are those who would tell now about the 
dead being raised to life, except that the world and 
even their brethren in the faith of God are so hard 
of hearing. They will testify to the truth of such 
miracles even in these days, however, rather than to 
permit any one to openly repudiate the word of their 
Lord in giving such power unto men. And if it is so 
in lifeless, decaying bodies, repelling in every way, 
what were once the possibiHties in bodies full of 
healthy life and quick response to the best their Father 
in heaven had for them? 

Without a doubt, had man, in the beginning, not lost 
but, rather, increased fulness of spiritual touch with 
God as God communed with him, he could have had 



158 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

the power of the Holy Ghost prophesied in Luke 1 :35, 
and fulfilled in due time. Notwithstanding this last 
had been foretold by the Lord (Isa. 7:14) it is doubt- 
ful if many believed it should be literally fulfilled, so 
contrary to nature did it seem. 

Who will say then that for this power to now be 
restored to man is beyond and foreign to the assurance 
of Christ that "nothing shall be impossible to you?" 
Matt. 17 :20. Or that it is not the will of our heavenly 
Father that it shall be done after the very manner of 
Christ's birth, who should become the "Firstborn of 
many brethren'* to the very letter? 

But man should expect to come into such touch with 
God through overcoming the subtlest deception Satan 
can bring to bear. He will withstand such a victory to 
the very last. He will make multitudes believe this 
very thought is of him. For then shall they turn from 
it quickly and miss the mark of God's highest for them. 
Satan's highest art is to conceal his own artifice. 

A little waiting before the Lord will show that all 
it requires is self-renunciation. That when self is out 
God comes in. And when God comes into man, as on 
the day of Pentecost, so that He fills the entire room 
where the assembly meets, why should it seem strange 
that His Living Presence in the Holy Ghost should 
"come upon" women and "the power of the Most High 
overshadow" them? 

Is the world not waiting for Christ to come again? 
Is it not throbbing to receive His power to overcome 
sin? Has not science advanced and moral influence 
increased until practical Christianity as manifested is 
often put to shame because the strongest Christians 
are weak? Is not the time about here for the Pres- 
ence of Christ to show Himself? 



THE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 159 

And yet — is the world ready for His final glory? 
Has man subdued and utilized more than a small por- 
tion of the earth in obedience to the command in Gen. 
1 :28? Is God, who was not willing that the fragments 
be wasted when Christ fed the multitude, so prodigal 
of His substance as to leave so much of the earth a 
waste which might bless many if time should permit? 
Or is the world so wicked there is no hope for it? Are 
there not multitudes of men and women with tender 
hearts and noble, who would readily receive a Christ 
of power and love, if He were but manifest to them? 
And shall swift judgment fall upon them because we 
fail to manifest Him? 

All these are questions to make us pause and con- 
sider if we have lived up to our privileges in making 
the world what it should be before God shall take hold 
in judgment. And if we have not, to call out to God 
to spare it for a time that we shall be guiltless before 
Him, and to give us the privilege of suffering more 
with Him that we may share in His glory. 

That Christ should come to earth again in that 
way, before His final coming in His Father's glory, is 
not inconsistent with God's will that His disciples 
"bear much fruit." For they shall aspire to the great- 
est work God has for them. And what is greater than 
this? And if one generation says it is impossible, an- 
other shall prove that nothing is impossible with Him. 

A race of beings thus born shall probably not die, 
for Christ "hath abolished death." 2 Tim. 1:10. If 
we can not accept this saying for us, in the visible, 
why shall we deny it for them? This race may be 
numerous, fulfilling literally the scripture, "as the 
lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even 
unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of 



160 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

man be. For wheresoever the carcass is, there will 
the eagles be gathered together." Matt. 24 :27. That 
is, wherever dying spirits and diseased bodies and hu- 
man needs are manifest He shall appear in power, as 
these "many brethren" of our Lord are scattered 
throughout the earth, in their ministry. 

If it be objected that the scriptures assure us that 
when He comes again He * 'shall so come in like man- 
ner as ye have seen Him go into heaven," when "a 
cloud received Him out of their sight," one can hear 
many relate visions they have had ^'seeing" Him com- 
ing in that very way. That none are looking for His 
coming also in the way we are speaking of signifies 
little. 

The Israelites did not look for a deliverer to come as 
Moses came. Nor was Elijah's second appearing looked 
for in John the Baptist. Perhaps no one would yet 
recognize it if Christ had not revealed the truth. Matt. 
17:12. Nor did the Jews expect Christ to come as He 
did. Even to the disciples who knew Him best was the 
truth hid, while to a centurion it was revealed. Mark 
14:50. Luke 24:21. Jno. 20:25. Mark 15:39. Hence 
let Christians take heed lest He come unawares in ways 
they are not looking for Him. But be ye ready to re- 
ceive Him and magnify His name when He does come. 

And if there are believers who think we are forsee- 
ing things too great for mankind in the part men and 
women play in them, be ye warned that there are 
enough who are not of our Lord's faith, but are mighty 
in this world, who see it wholly consistent with hu- 
manity who are in touch with a mighty God. Shall 
the saints doubt more than they? 

The period which should favor such a manifestation 
of God upon earth is about the time of the restoration 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 161 

of the Jews to Palestine, when God will show Himself 
to Israel, His firstborn of nations, in power that shall 
turn them to the Christ. At that time shall be ful- 
filled the remarkable statement of Isa. 4:1, 

"And in that day seven women shall take hold of 
one man, saying. We will eat our own bread, and wear 
our own apparel : only let us be called by thy name, to 
take away our reproach." 

Why? What ''reproach"? Is it a time of shame? 
Is it not implied that the "reproach" is from the fruits 
of shame? Is it a day when polygamy is a shelter to 
even the woman who would claim no support from a 
man? What kind of a "day" is it, really? 

It shall be a day "in the last days, that the mountain 
of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of 
the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; 
and all nations shall flow into it." Isa. 2:2. And 
"when the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and 
glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent 
and comely for them that are escaped out of Israel." 
"When the Lord shall have washed away the filth of 
the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood 
of Jerusalem from the midst thereof by the spirit of 
judgment, and by the spirit of burning." Isa. 4:2, 4. 

Then it is not a day of shame. It is a time of tri- 
umph and not of disgrace. The culminating time of 
blessings long promised and not the time of desertion 
by God. Are we not entering these "last days" now, 
when we are just getting ready to do things upon the 
earth in the name of our Lord? Then shall this life 
suddenly be cut off before we are permitted to magnify 
the Lord in the highest spiritual service of which we 
know? Is there not a period of greater and humbler 
service we may have a part in before our Lord comes 
in the glory of the very heavens? 



162 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

But let Isaiah 4:1 be interpreted along the line we 
have been noticing of the coming of Christ through 
the ministry of the disciples of the Lord, and how sim- 
ple it is ! For truly if it please the Lord to visit vir- 
gins as in the days of Joseph His visitation shall be 
one of joy and honor and not of humility and ostra- 
cism because of it. Therefore may we not expect Him 
to hear and respond to their natural cry to be freed 
from reproach that should fall upon them through 
this ministry, though they are ready and willing to 
bear everything else attending it, even to earning 
their own clothes and food? Surely it is a holy cry 
in a holy service, well fitting to the time when the Lord 
will bring glory upon spiritual Zion. 

It may all be understood consistent with God's gra- 
cious kindness when we regard the "man" here re- 
ferred to as the spiritual body of Christ, the "church 
of the firstborn." Heb. 12 :23. It is highly fitting that 
such a triumph should be the mission of the Church 
of the Firstborn, and that a woman should receive 
such power only through this church. It represents 
the Body of Christ in His most perfect form upon 
earth. Furthermore, a virgin might easily be under 
suspicion amongst well meaning people, except under 
the spiritual protection and defense of the Church of 
the Firstborn, in witness to her chaste and blameless 
life, and the peculiar baptism of the Holy Ghost with 
which the Lord should favor His handmaiden. 

"Seven women" is no doubt symbolical of a perfect 
number to do the ministry the Lord has for women in 
a group of this church. And when their ministry is 
perfected who shall say we shall not see an affirmative 
answer to the query of Isa. 66:8, "Shall a nation be 
born at once?" And then shall we not see the grace 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 163 

of our Lord towards His real Israel, in verses 5-14, 
and Isa. 4:2-6? 

We may expect that only men and women who are 
unmarried, as a rule (see 1 Cor. 7:32-34), who have 
this hope of God's mighty manifestation upon the 
earth, will be willing to crucify self until they are of 
one spirit, seeing "eye to eye" with each other in the 
Church of the Firstborn, as is necessary. It is only 
when there are a sufficient number of "one accord" 
in heart and soul in the ministry of this church that we 
can expect God to manifest His Mighty, Holy Hand. 
For there is room in all of this for such subtle en- 
croachments of Satan to bring reproach upon the name 
of Christ that only the Father's loving hand can keep 
him out. 

Before even the Church of the Firstborn may be 
entrusted with so great a mission there must be a 
band of men and women representing her ministry 
who have hearts of the Savior's own love and tender- 
ness when He refused to condemn a harlot brought be- 
fore Him in just accusation. They must be the pro- 
tectorates of all cast outs before the Lord will entrust 
to their keeping His holy ones whom the world should 
overwhelm with shame. For these chosen handmaidens 
of the Lord shall truly walk in fellowship with the 
Father in the Unseen ere they shall with joy accept 
this service of the Lord in the Seen. 

That God has never performed such a work upon 
earth should bring no doubts to any. In the first place, 
in how many church sects does there flow a love like 
this? To the cast outs in shame, or to those who are 
suspicioned of evil? And does not the church at large 
hold herself aloof from them instead of losing her repu- 
tation as the Master did, to save them? How many 



164 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

congregations are there which would receive a state- 
ment from a messenger of the Lord regarding His 
handmaiden with the simple faith of Joseph, as in 
Matt. 1:20, 24? How many do not shun a nameless 
child who is perfectly innocent of the crime of his 
birth? Then how many have the humility of spirit 
to receive a Son of God born of the Holy Ghost ? Truly, 
if men are not faithful in that which is least how 
shall the Lord commit to them the true riches from 
heaven? 

Therefore, is it not true the church has never been 
able to receive the coming of Christ the second time, 
in this way, with a love that ''thinketh no evil," since 
Christ's ascension until the present day ? And is it 
not significant that the time has arrived when a body 
of His children have been formed which verily has 
this love as the watchword of her usefulness in the 
world? Whose avowed world-wide mission has been 
to show the true self-sacrificing love of a crucified 
Savior to the outcasts of all the earth whom no one 
else wants, impartially with all other classes of society? 
And that upon the very morning of the completion of 
this manuscript a Home was formally dedicated to 
"nameless infants," by this body, to show them the 
care and love given to the babes of kings and queens? 
And when we say that this was all done in total ignor- 
ance of what we have written or known, do we not see 
the hand of the Lord at work in this very line? For 
we were not permitted by Him to reveal it to them. 
They read of it for the first time in this book. 

But Christ could not possibly come again, consistent- 
ly with God's spiritual laws until a spirit of this kind 
dwelt in His church upon earth. For in His first com- 
ing He was a nameless infant, and His church must be 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 165 

willing to receive Him as readily as Joseph was. If 
we do not receive all nameless children with Heaven's 
love what assurance is there that we should receive 
Him when He appears that way? And we may even 
now hinder His coming by our lack of perfect love. 

Again, no company of saints has ever tested Him 
fully, insomuch that they "have resisted unto blood, 
striving against sin." Heb. 12 :4. • The greatest at- 
tractiveness between two persons is naturally between 
men and women, and before this has reached its high- 
est in spiritual power there has usually resulted the 
fruits of marriage amongst them, their voluntary sep- 
aration for the Gospel's sake, or sin. 

There has not been the distinction made between the 
Seen and Unseen life as noted in former chapters. 
This power is in the Unseen. When mixed with the 
Seen it is weakened. And even in their highest as- 
pirations have not men and women tried to mix the 
Seen and the Unseen? 

But they have never been as beautiful to each other 
as it is their privilege to be. The heavenly beauty each 
is destined to bear in self-renunciation for the love of 
God has been snatched away from its placement by 
the Lord before its fresh bloom has scarce been seen, 
while earth's best has been reaped in the lower life. 
Self-renunciation has not been perfected in self -cruci- 
fixion because each have not seen Heaven's attraction 
in the other. And self-renunciation must be perfect. 
Why is it strange, then, that such things have not been 
anticipated by the children of the Lord? Strange 
would it be had they been. 

Doubtless a woman who is the favored handmaiden 
of the Lord in this ministry must have His grace to 
assume a Biblical spiritual relation to those who lead 



166 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

in this warfare. That is, of obedience and reverence 
to the will or wish, but not command, of men to whom 
she looks as her spiritual head. See 1 Cor. 11 :3. Eph. 
5:23. Perhaps it is to this great accomplishment 
through her that the word of God has always pointed 
in His approval of obedience of woman to man under 
all circumstances. And as women are faithful in minor 
duties in this relation they prepare themselves for the 
greatest honor the Almighty can bestow upon mortals. 
And if men have not advanced accordingly, women 
shall be honored with spiritual blessings anyhow, be- 
cause of their faithfulness in obedience, as Sarah was. 

There is also a high spiritual ministry for women 
in the times when these things shall be manifest. For 
it is an ideal state of the Church of the Firstborn when 
man shall stand in the place of ministry God has for 
him. When he may minister in the Most Holy Place 
(Ex. 26:33. Heb. 10:19) of the Lord's spiritual sanc- 
tuary. When he shall minister such truths from the 
Father Himself that, instead of his needing to go forth 
to proclaim them, the world of those who hunger in 
spirit shall flow to that place to receive knowledge of 
the Lord (Isa. 2:3) as they did from the Day of Pen- 
tecost until persecution came because of the healing 
of the lame man, and the preaching of Christ's resur- 
rection. But in "the last days" the people can bear 
such things without antagonism, as then. 

It is God's ideal, when man shall live so close to the 
Father that Satan can not deceive him. 1 Jno. 5:18. 
When he shall unfold truths right from the Father's 
heart which shall endure forever. 

Then shall the man who ministers in these deeper 
mysteries of God, unto which he is called (1 Cor. 4:1), 
be followed by "seven women," or a number sufficient 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 167 

for a perfect work, as noted, not for support or pleas- 
ure, as if to eat his bread or to be clothed by him, as 
though the relation were a social one, but for God's 
service under him. Not many men are called to this 
ministry (Jas. 3:1), which is reached through great 
crucifixion such as few will bear. And a man is not 
fitted for its effectiveness apart from women. 

The man who is called to teach from within the Most 
Holy Place becomes a teacher comparatively few will 
receive in all things. He dare not contend for the 
truths he receives and gives out because they are God's, 
and he must keep hands off. 2 Sam. 6 :7. Only thus 
can he keep on receiving. Women can receive from 
him and explain the truths to others. They will accept 
from her in faith what they will not receive from him 
through doubts, just as in the natural a woman can 
reveal the man whom she understands as he himself 
can not, because of the harsh and rough crust he pre- 
sents to the world. Her own sacrifice of self, as she 
ministers under man as her spiritual head, gives her 
entrance into hearts which would be steeled against 
him. Neither can accomplish God's purpose alone in 
this higher ministry, because of which Paul truly says, 
"Neither is the man without the woman, neither the 
woman without the man, in the Lord." 

Be it known, however, that this place of man and 
woman's ministry is the humblest there is. So humble 
that it shall not be published loudly, but they shall be 
known by the power and wisdom which go out from 
them, so that others seek them. It is the Father's own 
way in the Unseen. It is a ministry wherein "the lofty 
looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of 
man shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be 
exalted in that day." Isa. 2 :11, 17. 



168 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

In this ministry a man dare not cover his head (1 
Cor. 11 :4) because the hand of the Lord is felt directly 
upon his brain, as it were, controlling his mind, and 
the touch of a covering confuses him, thus "dishonor- 
ing his head" by permitting something to come be- 
tween them. In every thought, when in that place, he 
exalts the Lord alone by acknowledging it is from Him 
and not of himself in any way. And there the woman 
who performs her priestly office under him, manifests 
the man's ministry as above her own by veiling or 
covering her own head as a token of submission to him. 
1 Cor. 11:5. And she exalts the Lord alone by thus 
honoring His order of service, and presenting the 
truths received of the man as being of the Lord. 

Many of the truths we are considering are things 
which have been hid "from the wise and prudent" in- 
terpreters of scripture, through the ages, because their 
time of unfoldment was not at hand, such as we are 
now seeing. And even in this age of great things being 
done among men, these very wonders of God, accom- 
plished in the invisible church of the firstborn, will be 
largely swallowed up in the vortex of spiritual-human 
passion, activity, doubt, and greed, in a satisfied lower 
state of spiritual achievement, by those who know not 
the power of the invisible church in the midst of the 
visible. 

When these laws of the Spirit are known and chil- 
dren of God place themselves in obedience to the higher 
laws of the senses without abusing them to their selfish 
indulgences, the attraction of the flesh between two 
or more need not be feared. The loveliness of children 
of God, one to another, is very significant spiritually. 
For it is not flesh as flesh which attracts the truly 
spiritually minded, but the flesh is an index to the 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 169 

possibility of the spiritual life in the "agreement" of 
the persons attracted to each other. The absence of 
attraction signifies a limit to spiritual union which 
should be deplored rather than accepted with the wrong 
idea common, that it signifies the **flesh" is dead, when 
it is only sleeping, and not very soundly at that. Give 
it a chance and it will manifest itself in some way be- 
sides attraction. Probably in aversion or indifference 
or opposition. 

There is no question but that responsiveness be- 
tween two or more in their spiritual lives induces con- 
geniality in the flesh, especially between opposite sexes. 
Cupid is successful in all religious boarding schools. 
No sooner are men and women free in the power of 
the Spirit in Christian missions than marriages, or 
entanglements worse than marriage, often begin 
amongst persons who had previously dismissed all 
thought of such things. 

Evil need have no place when the relation growing 
naturally in the flesh through spiritual union is re- 
garded intelligently. For what should otherwise be 
regarded as a temptation in the flesh is but an inspira- 
tion to advance together in power in the Lord, which 
should be impossible otherwise. 

No one should venture, however, into that which he 
has reason to fear. In relations of this kind he should 
not take any chances whatever in the thought of run- 
ning the gauntlet of danger, with a hope of great 
power with God if he succeeds. For self would be at 
the bottom of it and he should surely fail. Self must 
be eliminated in all motives and God must be con- 
sciously within if one would see His power manifested. 

God has no favorites in this. All persons, regardless 
of temperament or inherited hindrances of responsive- 



170 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

ness, may have their natures mellowed to the attrac- 
tiveness of the Spirit of the Lord when self is out of 
God's way. And no favors in temperament or birth 
can overcome the hindrances of self unless God takes 
its place. One shall not go forth in this warfare, in 
Which the sensitiveness of the Spirit is very delicate, 
except with the happy consciousness of God's presence 
to withstand the adversary. 

It is a beautiful truth of heaven not always recog- 
nized, that in all union of men and women as co- 
workers in the Lord, the responsibility is upon men 
and not upon women. He is her head, and as a man 
of God he is not justified in faulting her for any error 
her weaker nature may lead him or her into. Weak- 
ness towards him signifies a meek and obedient spirit 
before him, which, in the sight of God, in their labors 
together, is of great price. 

Before God he is obliged to bear her weakness, if 
any, while she works with him in any spiritual cause 
whatever. Otherwise she may not trust him at all as 
her spiritual head or leader. Eph. 5 :23. 1 Cor. 11 :3, 
7. She would be obliged to cultivate a nature of fear 
and restraint which should prevent her openness to 
God's Spirit when He chose to bless her in His highest 
manner. And in the highest manner, such as we have 
been considering, she must be as free towards him as 
a child towards its parent, or as she is toward God. 

This is important. For man is now God's chosen 
channel of ministry of the Holy Ghost as the angel 
from heaven was in the annunciation to Mary. And if 
the channel be clogged through a fleshly reserve how 
shall God come in unto her in this way with His abid- 
ing presence? However, God may be thus brought to 
earth by man, not by trying, but through perfect love, 
as in chapter twelve. 



THE INFINITE IN TRINITY AND UNITY 171 

There must be a freedom from fear as if giving her 
life in spirit, soul, and body into his power, confident 
that the Holy Spirit of self-renunciation should con- 
trol him so that only the power and courtesy of that 
Spirit should manifest itself through Him. It is the 
spirit, not deed, of giving each to the other wholly, 
as illustrated in the Spirit of God giving Himself 
wholly to us, described in chapter twelve, which must 
avail in the wondrous work we are speaking of. But 
the moment the spirit of self in him moves to such 
giving, in the desire to receive, death, or separation 
from God's Spirit, enters, and there is failure. Or per- 
haps a demon may be brought forth. 

In all of this the promptings of the flesh beyond 
one's wish or power need not alarm the child of God. 
It is but one of the "temptations'* which Christ endured 
when He was, "in all points tempted like as we are, 
yet without sin." It is not sin to be prompted by the 
flesh, but sin is in yielding in either desire or act, to 
the promptings. Eve yielded to the desire of the flesh 
before the deed was done. It is as we overcome 
the promptings of the flesh, and not as we run away 
from the presence of the temptation, that God becomes 
strong in us. 

Most persons remain weaklings because they flee 
from the allurements of the flesh if they do not yield 
to them. They should, instead, "stand still and see the 
salvation of the Lord" by keeping true to Him in the 
face of the tempter, who is in self, always. Then His 
Spirit should enable them to overcome. As one makes 
this his practice temptations of all kinds, each follow- 
ing one more subtle than the former, will confront 
him. And when he or she remains immovable from 
God, filled with God's Holy Spirit of Self-renunciation 



172 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

to overcome every temptation, they shall prevail. When 
they shall have reached that strength that no possible 
temptation can separate them from God, and lead them 
to the desire of self, the things in this chapter are 
easily possible. 

It is man's place to appear before her in the loveli- 
ness and strength of a god, and she shall be innocent of 
any weakness, through him bearing it. God accepts 
her through his intercession exactly as man's weakness 
is borne through Christ, his Head. This is true whether 
the man be her husband or her spiritual leader. If 
men were real men of God no Godly woman would 
ever "fall." The things we are noting require real 
MEN of GOD. 

The sad disappointments universal in most efforts 
to raise ''fallen" women to a life established in their 
inheritance in Christ, is largely from the failure of 
men to reach God's side, where they may have wisdom 
and strength added to tenderness, to lead women to 
victory. There are few women who would not faith- 
fully follow such a leader. Men who can direct and 
inspire and comfort at just the right moment, so that 
the tendency to sin is swallowed up in obedience to a 
will and strength they do not wish to resist. It is the 
absence of such leadership in men which often dis- 
heartens those who yearn for freedom from self. And 
in its absence it is easy to turn and lure men to the 
wishes of self. 

Therefore it is that the redeeming of women from 
lives of shame by men who must be led by stronger 
women, or by women who can not, from the very na- 
ture of creation, take the place of strong men, will 
always be the greatest failure in human Christian 
endeavor. But let men arise in the strength of spir- 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 173 

itual manhood, as is their reasonable service of God, 
and we shall see results which are different. Then 
women who are created to power and accomplishment 
in motherly natures surpassed by none, and equaled 
by few, may be turned into angels of light and mercy 
for good, instead of becoming the greatest enticements 
for evil which Satan controls. 

This requires men who dare occupy places in the 
lead of women, such as God has appointed them, being 
the head of woman ''even as Christ is the head of the 
church." Or, as far ahead of her in the warfare with 
Satan's darkest spiritual forces, alone, as the frontier 
man in warfare with the elements bears their brunt 
more than does the woman who keeps his house for 
him. 

In the church men are not men as women are women. 
Woman is not to be faulted that she has caught up 
with man and has often surpassed him in the spiritual 
battle going on. Because the Lord says, in speaking 
of the "last days," that, "As for my people, children 
are their oppressors, and women rule over them" (Isa. 
3:12), it is not to her discredit. But it is to the spir- 
itual shame of men who have not been men, capable 
of such "rule" in the house of the Lord that women 
should joyfully bow in obedience to their wishes or 
wills, without command or rule. Or that forces of the 
world as weak as children in comparison to the weak 
things of God, should "oppress" them. Is it not so? 

Not until men of God have reached their appointed 
place ahead of the women living who are most in touch 
with God, dare we say these things are unreasonable 
in the Lord. Spiritual men, to occupy this place, must 
be as far ahead of pious women as are the kings of 
finance, commerce, science, and invention in advance 



174 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

of women in the same spheres respectively. If not, 
what lesson do they teach us in this? 

Is it not true that only in spirituality are real cap- 
able men weak enough to be satisfied with a work in 
comparison with women, such as would shame and 
humiliate strong men of the world in relation to the 
world's leaders of women in the same line? All the 
fault of this does not lie with individuals among men. 
Each has his respective "gift of the Spirit" as noted 
in chapter three, to be sacredly used. But men have 
not had the forbearance and love and esteem of each 
other in the Lord's Body to which they are surely 
called. They do not equal the wisdom of the world in 
the organization of their forces, which are spiritual. 

We have no controversy with those who see differ- 
ently upon these matters. This is no day for conten- 
tion, but of mighty and powerful living in the Lord. 
Without this interpretation of the spirit of the word 
of the Lord it is very puzzling to understand some por- 
tions of it. For instance, the command to "be fruitful 
and multiply and replenish the earth" (Gen. 1:28), 
and then the condemnation written in the symbolic 
account of apparent obedience to that command, in 
the third chapter of Genesis. 

Again, Christ's commendation of abstinence from 
marriage (Matt. 19:11, 12), in contrast with the first 
command, considering what the end should be if all 
were to heed Him. To place women as spiritual helps 
only to men, as God's highest relation for them, would 
be to both rebuke the command heretofore noted, and 
to condemn many who have married, not for the lust 
of the flesh, but with God's highest in view. If they 
have not seen that highest in the light we present, 
they are innocent of transgression. It would further- 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 175 

more seem strange that abstinence should place those 
of Rev. 14 :3, 4, in such peculiar favor with God 
through ignoring His creation of sex. 

This is the more noteworthy when we consider that 
it is male and female which formed the creation of 
man in the image of God. Gen. 1 :27. And that the 
relation between man and woman is a holy mystery, 
typical of Christ and the church (Eph. 5:23-33), truly 
reveals God's hand in a way that is significant of 
things very wonderful to believe in their combined 
ministry. And yet we must believe when He shows us 
clearly, for "with God all things are possible." 

We have spoken of the power to produce offspring 
through the power of the Holy Ghost, independent of 
the natural senses, as being perhaps the greatest thing 
man is called unto. And yet we dare not anticipate 
what is the greatest, wonderful as that is, lest we hin- 
der God working through us still more marvelously. 

When we see that perfect self-renunciation in the 
natural is necessary for the paradox of perfect union 
of a self for others wholly, in the spiritual, in order 
that the Holy Ghost may have this power, we may 
wonder what other power may follow self-renuncia- 
tion. When God so perfectly renounced Himself that 
He illustrated this paradox of a perfect union with a 
Self for others wholly. He became a Creator of worlds 
and worlds and worlds of things and beings, with 
man as His highest product, because in His own image. 
But His creation is indefinable by man, so extensive 
is it. 

When man, who by nature is a creator in his own 
little world of things through renouncing self here 
and there, reaches that perfection of self-renunciation 
which brings forth beings in his own Godlike image 



176 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

solely through the power of the Holy Ghost, has he 
not reached a privilege which signifies the beginning 
of a life of creation through touch with God by which 
in the next life, if not in this, he may go on and on 
with many, many creations which it is impossible now 
to anticipate? Truly, self-renunciation which, with 
God Himself, meant His wonderful, wonderful creation 
of all things, probably means so much to us that we 
simply dare not anticipate the power following it, when 
it has once reached that perfection of giving inde- 
pendent life to beings through the gift of the Holy 
Spirit. 

We may conceive that it is through the gift of life, 
closely allied to the gift of healing in its greatest full- 
ness and perfection, that the Holy Ghost may "come 
upon'* those who are responsive to God's highest life- 
giving power, seeing that healing from God is through 
life from Him. If old bodies are made new through the 
gift of healing is it not but a step deeper into Heaven's 
life that new bodies take up their abode in the Unseen 
where Heaven would place them, independent of the 
natural senses ? Is not the "Power of the Highest" still 
able to "overshadow" those who are able to receive 
Him independent of the natural, as in Luke 1:35? 
When Christ and not men are seen in servants of God 
who dare to walk in His power so softly that the laws 
of the Spirit are not transgressed? Is not God able to 
lead men that blamelessly? Has not the fault been in 
men rather than in women, and not at all in God's will- 
ingness and power to do such mighty works ? 

This "gift of life" of the Spirit is received after the 
general law of receiving greatly of the Spirit. That 
is, in the gift of knowledge or wisdom, for instance, he 
becomes beside himself as it were, in darkness or con- 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 177 

fusion amidst men and circumstances, so that he feels 
completely lost, before he receives perfectly from 
heaven. 'If any man thinketh he knoweth anything, 
he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know." 1 Cor. 
8 :2. When He gets to the end of self God enters for 
others. So it is in this gift. 

And still there is the cautious Bible reader's query, 
''where is the promise of these things? Where the 
Word of the Lord which says they shall be ? The chap- 
ter and verse?" 

It is a caution we would have none ignore before 
accepting new truths, lest it afford an easy path into 
error. The answer, however, may be seen in many 
scriptures, and then again it may be seen in none. It 
depends upon the spirit in which they are read. All 
who can accept it in faith will surely be led into a 
holier walk with God. 

This being true, to those whom it makes clear a 
single mysterious subject of scripture, may it not ap- 
pear as the Word of the Lord in that place? For the 
true "Word of the Lord" is in the expression of His 
will, and not in the mystery of printed characters. It 
becomes His "word" to us only when the mystery is 
revealed. And if many scriptures are made clear by 
the word which we speak, may it not be the Word of 
the Lord in them ? And if the end of God's great plan 
of salvation and power through the instrumentality 
of redeemed men and women is glorified, does not the 
Word of the Lord appear in this interpretation? But 
if it should bring doubts in the minds of any, or make 
His precious words less sweet in any way, it is not the 
word of the Lord to those persons. 

God does not always reveal Himself in His written 
word in things we may know without the Word. He 



178 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITT 

has established laws of health, for instance, of which 
He has not told us in word, but we have learned them 
through experience. They are His "word" to us just 
the same, and we are condemned for disregarding them 
as truly as though He had written the condemnation 
in letters. God is too great to reveal Himself within 
the compass of a small Book like the Bible, in many 
matters we can grasp without it. His will is included 
in His written Word, but in a depth not always under- 
stood except as unfolded through men who are com- 
missioned to "speak as the oracles of God." 

There are many indeed who would accept the hard- 
est things we have written if we could point to a "thus 
saith the Lord," though the statement be less clear 
than the reasoning He gives us in their presentation. 
But it has not pleased God to reveal them in that way. 
It would defeat the very end desired. They would 
then be received in the letter and not in the Spirit. 

The things of this chapter are too great to be accom- 
plished except through the Spirit. It is a "way of 
life" so "narrow" that "few there be that find it." Few 
may enter into the greatest things God has for us. 
This is illustrated in the end, when, amongst many 
multitudes of redeemed ones, only 144,000 are able to 
learn the highest song of praise. 

So there are comparatively few who get in the closest 
possible touch with God upon earth. And for the 
things we speak of, a great many do not need to enter. 
It is not like salvation, which must be offered to all 
or it is no salvation. Only those whom the Spirit of 
our Lord shall call need enter this ministry. To them 
only who can bear it, is it given. 

We do know, with Paul, that "the earnest expecta- 
tion of the creature (Lit. creation) waiteth for the 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 179 

manifestation of the sons of God." Rom. 8:19. Must 
it wait until the "redemption of our bodies"? Ver. 23. 
Or is it possible to alleviate its groaning and travailing 
in pain (ver. 22) through the ministry of "sons of 
God" who are a new race, as it were, of beings born 
of the Holy Ghost through the spiritual fatherhood of 
the Church of the Firstborn? Then should many 
Christs free humanity from the yoke of bondage upon 
every hand. 

This "manifestation" is not the final glory of Christ 
in the Father, but it precedes Him. Therefore in all of 
this we are not predicting Christ's final coming to the 
earth. It is but the forerunner of that great and glor- 
ious appearing. 

That some who were regarded as Godfearing men 
have heretofore taught the creation of human beings 
through purely spiritual fatherhood, and have blasted 
the ideal held forth, through yielding to the tempta- 
tions of the flesh, need be no stumbling block to the 
real truth. If they had holy desires for such manifes- 
tations of God, and a spirit of prophecy from the Lord, 
it is presumptive evidence that there are such things 
for God's children, just as a normal appetite for an 
acid fruit is evidence that there is an acid fruit some- 
where to satisfy the appetite. And that such men have 
"fallen" through inability to resist temptation, may 
have been the result of seeking to usurp power which 
belongs exclusively to the spiritual Church of the First- 
born, as noted. And even this church may reach such 
a triumph only when self is crucified in men until 
physical desire is consumed wholly through spiritual 
touch with God and His children, as described pre- 
viously. 

The mission of the Church of the Firstborn, in this 



180 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

respect, must be regarded in the light of spiritual laws, 
and truths put in practice, as presented in all of the 
preceding chapters of this book. They, together with 
the chapters following, form a connected chain which 
cannot be ignored if we would have God's best for us. 
And until the highest spiritual life is manifested, 
which is possible, as taught therein, and the greater 
light followed as it appears along the way, dare we 
say that anything which is seen in faith is too great 
for man and God together? Then dare we say it now, 
seeing that we scarce have entered ankle deep into 
waters of truth which, as in Ezekiel's vision, are too 
great for us to swim except we are borne up by the 
kindness of our Father's hand? 

Finally, the plea in behalf of the present chapter 
is written, not to win adherents to it, but lest it be 
found a stumbling-block to some who would enter the 
richness of our Lord's fellowship which is possible only 
in the spirit of the Church of the Firstborn, and in 
line with the instruction in the chapters preceding 
this one. We do not want them turned from receiving 
what they are able, which we have written. And "Unto 
Him that is able to keep you from falling, and to pre- 
sent you faultless before the presence of His glory 
with exceeding joy", (Jude 24) do we commit it all. 
Let those receive it who can, and let those who can 
not, rejoice with those who hail this ministry gladly, 
that all may be partakers of the best fruits the Lord 
can give unto His children. 

For we know there are many, many thousands who 
can not receive it for themselves. It costs too much 
in careful walking, imbibing the Word, or studying it 
to show themselves "approved unto God, a workman 
that needeth not be ashamed" in weak faith. Theirs 



TRE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 181 

is an easier ministry along well known lines of the 
Holy Ghost. 

But as truly as the kingdom of heaven shall advance 
with wisdom equal to the kingdoms of this world in 
science, art, invention, etc., there must be a few dar- 
ing and aggressive souls who, willing to even lose their 
reputation, will blaze the way through the darkness of 
man's mind, by discovering the deeper and more exact 
and sensitive and powerful laws of the Spirit of Life, 
and living true to these laws with a fidelity worthy of 
their divinity, equal to men and women who bury both 
natural and spiritual lives to triumph in the natural 
kingdom. 

May it not be true that in the Christian life there 
is a kind of spiritual evolution wherein trials come 
which some are able to survive, and then to minister 
upon a plane not permitted to those who could not en- 
dure with gladness these same trials, and who there- 
fore are given a ministry upon the highest plane they 
can bear? Do we not see it continually confronting us? 

To illustrate: Some are perfectly content to be 
wrapped up in their own families, worshipping God 
in public by attending church once per week and giving 
alms sometimes to a few whom they are certain are 
"worthy.'* It is all they can bear. Trials to move 
them higher would but embitter them and make them 
lose faith in God. Therefore God gives them His sweet 
peace. And when they see others struggling through 
great afflictions into a higher spiritual state they mis- 
understand it all. They regard them as the people 
regarded our Savior — **We did esteem Him stricken, 
smitten of God, and afflicted." Isa. 53 :4. 

It is God's way. He chastiseth that son whom He 
loveth. He will permit trials to come to each in order 



182 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

to free him of self and permit his ascension upon the 
highest plane of service he can bear, or, rather, the 
lowest, for it is a plane of greater humility the more 
it is Godlike. And those who have come at rest upon 
the humblest olane they can bear joyfully, will ever 
misunderstand their struggles. They will think the 
others are in bondage and will wish they could be as 
free as they themselves are. Let them bear the mis- 
judging, and walk alone with God if need be until 
their appointed plane of service is reached. The more 
Godlike this plane is the more heavenly will be the 
peace that finally sets upon their brow to bless those 
who had judged them. 

Therefore if there is a humbler and more Godlike 
plane of service than men and women have lived upon, 
let those who are able to enter it bear the crucifixion of 
self which is necessary, walking alone with God to the 
goal before them. 

"And yet show I unto you a more excellent way. in 
chapter eleven, than mere crucifixion of self. And if 
but one or two should receive the message, it shall 
verily be given in the spirit and love of Christ who 
would no doubt have come to earth to suffer if there 
had been but one soul here who would have accepted 
His redemption, which was for all. 

In order for us to believe that there "shall a nation 
be born at once," after the order herein foreseen, we 
must perceive the workings of spiritual law to their 
divine consummation, with the certainty that scientists 
perceive natural laws which shall bring about things 
the layman thinks impossible. It was illustrated by 
Darwin when he wrote regarding the relation which 
exists between honey-bearing flowers and insects, 
and the purpose thereof. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 183 

Upon his declaring that all honey deposits are for 
the purpose of luring insects to sip the honey, and 
thereby become the means of cross-fertilizing the 
flower, a man wrote him from Madagascar ridiculing 
his theory. For he reported the existence of a certain 
flower there with a nectary eleven inches long, with 
honey at its base. And if Mr. Darwin's theory be 
true there must be a moth in existence with a tongue 
eleven inches long with which to sip the honey. No 
one had seen such a moth, and the idea of it existing 
was so preposterous that it appeared to overthrow 
Darwin's theory. 

Mr. Darwin, however, is said to have replied with 
undaunted faith, that the existence of such a flower 
was conclusive evidence of the existence of a moth 
with a tongue eleven inches in length, whether or not 
such a moth were known to man. His faith in natu- 
ral laws was rewarded shortly afterwards by the dis- 
covery of such a moth upon that flower, which estab- 
lished the truth of his theory in that instance. 

If men exhibit such confidence in natural laws con- 
cerning the apparently impossible, shall not men who 
have learned to know God have equal confidence in the 
certainty of spiritual laws? And shall they fear to 
stand upon truths of the Unseen which the many fail 
to perceive, lest they be scoffed at, any more than the 
naturalist dares brave the ridicule of his fellows who 
do not see? 

And so we have that faith in that which we write of 
as God's purpose in spiritual births, as being pre-deter- 
mined by fixed spiritual laws, that we confidently fore- 
see it shall come to pass upon the earth, even if we 
should not live to behold it. Some one, like Simeon, of 
old, shall see it, and cry out in rejoicing, 



1B4 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

"Mine eyes have seen thy salvation." 

And truly the signs of the times indicate that the 
time of the coming of our Lord draweth nigh. And 
each man who honors every woman as the possible 
mother of his Lord may truly, as a member of the 
Church of the Firstborn, have a part in bringing Him 
to earth again. God speed the day when a mighty host 
the world around will invisibly unite in this spirit. 



CHAPTER X. 
"Not as man seeth." 1 Sam. 16:7. 

When a person has familiarized himself with the 
laws of the senses and spiritual life so that he sees in 
much of the attraction of the flesh a possibility of 
greater spiritual touch, he would naturally infer that 
the greatest spiritual touch with God and with each 
other would be manifest in a company of worshippers 
who are the most congenial to one another. 

This would perhaps be the case were their minds all 
unitedly fixed steadfast upon God in freedom from self. 
But this is next to an impossibility in such a group, 
so insidiously does the flesh appeal to self. It is so true 
that the very pleasure in each other through the senses 
which inspires them with hope for greater things to- 
gether in reaching God, also withstands a fixture of 
one's eyes upon God to accomplish these great things. 
The inspiration is ever confronted with a worm ready 
to eat out its heart. But as God is greater than self 
so is the inspiration greater than the worm, else con- 
geniality would entirely destroy fruitfulness. 

As "workers together with God" a group of dis- 
ciples are "bearing fruit" unto the Lord. "Bearing 
fruit" is not merely a pleasing figurative expression. 
It will stand analysis in the spiritual union just as we 
may analyze the laws of fruit bearing in the kingdom 
of plant life. And this analysis will give us real light 
regarding power together in the kingdom of heaven 
upon earth. 

To illustrate: A "perfect" flower is one which has 



186 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

both stamens and pistils. It is complete in itself. It 
has such a congeniality within its own being that noth- 
ing is lacking. It holds not a foreign element or a con- 
flicting nature in its own bosom. It is able to perpetu- 
ate its species through its own organs of reproduction. 
And the florist, anxious to preserve the perfection of 
the race as he beholds a faultless bloom may seek to 
protect it from crossing with other flowers. For he 
reasons that it will then fertilize itself and surely per- 
petuate its like. 

But right here nature takes hold. She says, "not 
so," and in her cunning she has arranged to prevent 
this very possibility unless man by still greater cun- 
ning is able to outwit her. For Nature has endowed 
most of her flowers with the power to prevent self- 
fertilization, either by the arrangement of the repro- 
ductive organs or by refusing to allow the pollen to 
come in contact with the stigma when the latter is in 
a receptive condition. More than that, she has re- 
sorted to the greatest ingenuity in many cases to induce 
cross-fertilization. 

Honey is secreted in a little cup to allure bees and 
insects to sip therefrom. And then, anticipating their 
visits, she has so arranged pollen and stigma that 
the former will certainly be carried from other flowers 
and lodged upon the latter at just the right time to 
insure perfect fertilization. This is so well known the 
subject has become one of profitable study, and of in- 
creasing wonder at the persistency of her efforts to 
prevent self-fertilization. And it illustrates a univer- 
sal truth in spiritual fruit bearing which is seldom 
regarded by man. 

The laws of the Spirit are as inexorable as the 
laws of nature, and because of this their disregard is 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 187 

followed by barrenness of results in comparison with 
much effort expended. The possibilities through ob- 
serving laws of the Spirit which are illustrated in this 
one peculiarity of Nature can not well be estimated. 
We have not been taught this lesson by all Nature 
through all the ages, except God has something of great 
value in it for us. 

But first, what would be the result were the perfect 
flower permitted to fertilize itself? The offspring would 
be weaker than the parent. The flower or plant would 
deteriorate, noticeable in time if not immediately. 
Cross-fertilization, on the other hand, is a means not 
only of the species holding its own superior qualities 
but, under wise selection, of increasing its value until 
the original is scarcely recognized. A perfection in 
the plant's service to man is thus reached which is im- 
possible in many plants through self-fertilization. That 
there are exceptions, in which some flowers fertilize 
themselves naturally, does not alter the rule or the les- 
son it illustrates in the Spirit. 

The tendency almost universal in groups of "workers 
together with God" is to become "self -fertilizers." That 
is, to seek congenial associates to work together with 
one another. To seek those of like mind in prefer- 
ence to others. To value "unity of the Spirit," which 
self loves, and avoid those of a different "spirit." It 
is demonstrated by the multitude of church sects, each 
of which is held together by their love of "self-fertiliza- 
tion." That is, their love of "bearing fruit" unto God 
in their own united, congenial selves. 

Is it not as true as can be? Most of them, in their 
commencement as sects, were a group of earnest souls 
who agreed to drop differences in their hunger for God 
in ways not given them in the old church. And then 



188 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

God poured out His Spirit upon them. They bore "much 
fruit." The more they were persecuted the more fruit- 
ful were they. It was because persecution made them 
see the spirit in each other and not see their differences, 
which may have been great by nature. 

Later, when the sect became strong and settled down 
in an undisturbed condition they began to see each 
other's faults. And as they saw faults they drew off 
into groups, cliques, and congregations, freezing out, 
or ruling out, or disciplining out many whom they 
would have warmly fellowshipped in the commence- 
ment of the sect. And their f ruitf ulness in the power 
of the Lord waned accordingly. 

Thus it has come to pass that "the social feature" is 
recognized in the majority of the churches as a band 
to hold their membership together, unequaled, perhaps, 
by any other. It is the principle of self-fertilization 
so universally forbidden in Nature, now embraced 
warmly in our Lord's spiritual kingdom. Is it any 
wonder the church is weakened in strength and power? 
What floriculturist or horticulturist or gardener would 
anticipate success in their respective pursuits under a 
like system of self-fertilization of plants? Or what 
stock-raiser who seeks to retain a likeness of blood in 
his strains without much regard to the superior quali- 
ties ? Are not the systems parallel so far as intentions 
would affect the results ? 

That the church has what power she has is because 
God in His goodness has not permitted men to man- 
age it wholly. But He has permitted persecutions to 
come and disturbances to separate, so that "new blood" 
in the way of persons used of the Spirit differently, has 
entered in spite of the resistance of the body of wor- 
shippers. Strength has thereby entered, although many 
are often blind to it. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 189 

Upon the other hand, we may predict much spiritual 
power and strength and fruit bearing in that body of 
God^s children who give equal welcome and tolerance 
to all who are born of Him, and who welcome disturb- 
ances of an evil spirit in their midst as an adversary to 
be overcome and the person to be turned into a com- 
rade to advance against the powers of darkness in the 
name of their Lord. This is "cross-fertilization'* in 
the spiritual kingdom. There is no self -nursing here. 
No "freezing out" or setting aside of any. But there is 
warmth to overcome in love and melt together in an 
advance that knows no obstacles to God's power. 

It is so in groups which will be led into God's great- 
est victories. Not to consist of individuals attracted 
together through congeniality by way of the natural 
senses. But drawn together through the earnestness 
of a spirit to be filled with God and freed of self. The 
result, when perfect, will be that those of the greatest 
antagonism through the natural senses will be mel- 
lowed to each other with a warmth that is no different 
from those who are naturally the most congenial 
through the senses. This will be the test as to the 
Spirit's rule in such a body. There will be power 
through those naturally opposed to each other, not 
because their union is more perfect, but because there 
is less temptation to get their eyes off of God and upon 
self, than where there is attraction through the senses. 

The director of the Lord's spiritual battles will not 
lose sight of this law, and of the need of the servants 
of the Lord to become so melted as one life that the 
Spirit of God upon them will see the beauty and attrac- 
tiveness of God in all alike. In other words, that con- 
geniality in the Spirit will be so perfect as to eclipse, 
absolutely, congeniality through the senses, so that it 
shall be possible to see one another as God sees us. 



190 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITT 

For the natural man "looketh on the outward ap- 
pearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart." 

It is a question again of the Seen or the Unseen. 
And in the Unseen, viewed by faith, lies all victory. 

One can readily see the absolute necessity of self- 
crucifixion in order to have so impartial a view of 
one's fellow disciples. Self-renunciation is not suf- 
ficient. Neither is the common idea of self -crucifixion, 
which is but self-abnegation. Crucifixion as symbol- 
ized upon Calvary is much more and much greater 
than both. 

That is to say, to renounce self is to turn from its 
attractions as though there were no self in existence. 
To abnegate self is to cast self behind one's back as 
something which exists, but which shall not influence 
us. Neither is possible as a continual experience ex- 
cept through crucifixion after the manner of God in 
Christ. 

This was, in brief, to see the Father so attractively 
through all of the senses, either direct or indirect, that 
His glory eclipsed every appeal through the natural. 
It was illustrated when Christ, in His third prayer in 
Gethsemane reached the state where He could with 
rapturous spirit in heaviness of the flesh exclaim, "Not 
my will, but thine be done." And when, upon the cross 
He saw His Father's perfection so glorious for all who 
had mistreated Him that He cried out, "Father forgive 
them, for they know not what they do." 

Do you think one wrong loomed before Him greater 
than another then? No. The possibility of all who 
had done evil entering with Him into His Father's 
glory was so great and beautiful that He lost all sense 
of distinction between evil deeds done. Then it was 
that "in His humiliation His judgment was taken from 



THE INFINITE, IN TBINITY AND UNITY Idl 

Him/* The Father's fellowship in Spirit was so pre- 
cious as to sweep away at last the desire of natural 
fellowship amongst men. Therefore distinctions were 
swept away. 

There is no doubt this is the way of the crucifixion 
Christ suffered in ''being made perfect" (Heb. 5:9) in 
the flesh. And it is the crucifixion of Self which God 
suffered when He began the creation. He saw it all 
perfect from the beginning and His love made no dis- 
tinction. If anything He made must be burned away 
it was but to purify a place for something perfect to 
appear. 

To Him eternal life is like a great painting an ar- 
tist is producing. The artist sees as much beauty in 
the shadows as in the lights, losing sight of either as 
individual parts of the picture in the rapture of the 
ideal he is producing. As it is with God so will it be 
with us when self is crucified. We shall not weep be- 
cause of the pain, but shall rejoice because of the glor- 
ious ideal in God, casting the ideal or the uncomeliness 
of the flesh, alike, into the twilight. 

But until we endure complete crucifixion of self while 
in the flesh we can not live continually in a heaven of 
glory while here below, pertaining to all things. In 
the line of our "gift of the Spirit" it is possible, when 
the use of each gift is perfected, through crucfiixion of 
self after the manner just noted. 

For example, when the ''gift of knowledge" (1 Cor. 
12:8) is perfected we see no difference in value in 
knowledge, but minister as joyously in the simplest as 
in the deepest things, to help others. In the gift of 
teaching, instead of valuing our knowledge of teaching 
above that of others, we accept everything the Father 
permits to be brought forth in word or deed or circum- 



192 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

stance^ as equally valuable, seeing the glory of His will 
and wisdom in its permission, though we see the truth 
differently because we see from a plane different than 
that from which it is presented. In the gift of prayer 
we behold as great a God to give us one morsel of food 
as to feed multitudes, or to heal the tiniest pimple as 
the most virulent cancer. In the gift of giving (Rom. 
12 :8) we give a hundred dollars as readily as five cents, 
to the needy, knowing our God will as readily supply 
the larger amount as the smaller. 

In the gift of ''ruling," one's authority is exercised 
over a mob of malicious evil-doers as calmly and quietly 
as over a meek brother who has innocently erred from 
the right. For he sees a God who is as able to control 
the one, through him, as the other. In the ''gift of 
tongues" one as gladly and readily ministers to others 
in their own strange tongue as to those of his own 
tongue. Or he talks in the language of earth as gladly as 
in the language of heaven, seeing that God is glorified 
in the love message which is given, and not in the 
sounds that go forth. In the gift of miracles he looks 
upon things which are very wonderful to others, im- 
passionately, seeing the same God in marvelous or sim- 
ple things alike. 

In the gift of healing or of bringing life into the 
dead, as in Matt. 10 :8 and 1 Jno. 5 :16, all bodies and all 
souls appear alike to him in the heavenly halo which 
drops over them, as he sees God's perfected body or re- 
deemed soul for them. 

It is so pertaining to the perfect use of all of the gifts 
of the Spirit. It is also after this order that men and 
women shall suffer crucifixion of self in order to fully 
accomplish our Lord's ministry upon earth. Then it is 
that Paul's ideal is reached, "that both they that have 



THE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 193 

wives be as though they had none." And it is because 
it is so hard to break away from pleasure's experiences 
through the natural senses by reason of close acquain- 
tance in the married state, that few married persons 
can reach that state of spiritual perception wherein the 
glory of the Lord is so everwhelming as to obliterate 
the special nearness of those with whom they are of 
**one flesh." But only then is the gift of healing, or of 
giving life, perfected. 

Only then may the Church of the Firstborn accom- 
plish her perfect ministry in bringing the "many 
brethren" of Christ amongst men. Only then in these 
gifts do we have the glory of heaven of which it is said, 
"the former (heavens and earth) shall not be remem- 
bered, nor come into mind." Isa. 65:17. It is surely 
the way of the gifts of the Spirit in their perfect min- 
istry just as it is the way of heaven's glorification above 
the best upon earth. 

This is the spirit men and women must have amongst 
each other in order for God to work through them as 
He desires. It is only crucifixion of self after this 
order which can fill them with a spirit of innocency 
and freedom such as filled Adam and Eve at that period 
when their spiritual power through touch with God 
was at its zenith. Gen. 2:25. 

When a man has the gift of healing through the lay- 
ing on of hands, perfected, the most beautiful being 
upon earth, and the pleasantest to the touch will not 
be known because of the glorified body of Christ he sees 
in it. And the most uncomely will appear the same 
through the same Christ. And in God's order of 
strength and obedience, wherever it is honored woman 
shall be the "glory of man" (1 Cor. 11:7), whom he 
honors as "the weaker vessel" regardless of individ- 



194 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

uality, or natural relationship. And as her spiritual 
vision is perfected she shall behold every man who 
leads in spiritual things as the voice and minister of 
God to her. 1 Cor. 11 :3. 

Then, in reaching toward this place of God's order, 
dare she have authority over any man, seeing that God 
may at any moment exalt him to a special ministry, 
even as He chose Paul? Seeing also that God anoints 
in secret before the anointing is manifest to the world, 
as in the instance of Saul. 1 Sam. 10 :1. 

After all, the ideal in which we shall behold the per- 
sons of all men and women that the glory of the Lord 
outshines both their excellencies and deficiencies so 
that we see neither as such, is but seeing the Father's 
"Hand" hiding Himself from us as He "passes by," as 
we noticed in chapter six. And when this "Hand" is 
as beautiful to us as His "back parts," when His Pres- 
ence going before us inspires us to press on after Him, 
our ministry will be powerful in the Lord's simplicity 
which is then in us. Then it is we can have fellow- 
ship with the Father in the perfect ministry of a gift 
or gifts direct from Him. 

This fellowship costs something. We must grow 
through trials into perfect ministry. The question is, 
are we willing to pay the price? Then it is ours. It 
requires the renunciation of self such as the Father 
experienced, in order to enter His fellowship. It re- 
quires the crucifixion of self such as He endured in 
order to continue in the joy we enter through self-re- 
nunciation. Self is so great a being in us and so tena- 
cious of his existence through multitudinous avenues 
of life that there is only one experience whereby we 
may certainly know that self is completely out of God's 
way through us. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 195 

That is, our supreme happiness. We are supremely- 
happy when self is out. When self is out we are su- 
premely happy. It is a "two-edged sword" that cuts 
both ways. Turn the question howsoever we will the 
test is the same. The word ''supreme," however, does 
not express it. "Perfect" might describe it if we knew 
what perfection were. The experience is of the Spirit, 
which words can not define. But the more perfect our 
happiness the more completely is self out of God's way 
in and through us. God is love, and love is happiness. 
We can not be free of self without God's love coming 
into us bodily. We can not be filled with God's love, 
to the exclusion of self, without perfect happiness. 

We think self is out but are not supremely happy, 
and wonder why. We can not discern self's presence 
by thinking. It requires the Holy Spirit of self-renun- 
ciation to reach the heart. See Rom. 8 :27. When we 
are not filled with Him in perfect happiness we may 
know self is there. The Holy Spirit can bring to our 
minds wherein self lies hidden within us that it may 
be removed by His love. 

Contrary to the common idea, perfect happiness 
springs from loving and not from being loved. It dif- 
fers in this from human happiness which demands that 
one shall both love and be loved. Therefore it has been 
truly written, 

"The sense of the world is short — 
Long and various the report — 

To love and be beloved ; 
Men and gods have not outlearned it ; 
And, how oft soe'er they've turned it. 

Not to be improved." 

This, however, is not the "sense" of the Christian's 



196 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

God, albeit Christians would think it is. And although 
it is ''not to be improved" by the world, it may be won- 
drously improved upon by the sons of God. For God's 
happiness is perfect through loving regardless of 
whether He is loved in return. It is God's own spirit 
of happiness which Paul reflected when he said, *'I will 
very gladly spend and be spent for you; though the 
more abundantly I love you the less I be loved." 2 Cor. 
12:15. 

God truly does want us to love Him and our brethren 
also. For it is our happiness He desires and He well 
knows that only thus can we be happy. His ''first com- 
mandment" is that we shall love Him with all our 
"heart, soul, and mind," or "might." See Matt. 22:37. 
Deut. 6:5. How can we do this and have a care as 
to whether we are being loved? 

But the commandment is for our happiness and not 
for His satisfaction in Self. He delights in our love 
because He knows that only as we love Him and His 
can we be happy. If God's happiness were dependent 
for its perfection upon others loving Him it would sig- 
nify that His Self has not been wholly renounced and 
crucified. Also that He was not happy before the cre- 
ation of other beings. 

So we may know that when we are unhappy because 
others do not love us it is because self has not been re- 
nounced and crucified. It is when we love others with 
self out of the way so completely that we make no dis- 
tinction as to whether our love is received or returned, 
that we take our first step into perfect happiness. It 
is God's love in us which can thus go out to others from 
us. It was illustrated upon and following the day of 
Pentecost. "We love Him because He first loved us." 
That is. He first put that love within us which is able 
to love Him in the same way. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 197 

And even when we love Him as we must for perfect 
happiness we lose all thought of whether He loves us. 
The very thought of Him loving us is to introduce self, 
which hinders a greater inflow of His wonderful love. 
But we do always remember and rejoice in the truth 
that He gave Himself for us in Christ Jesus, as His 
same spirit impels us to give ourselves in love for 
others. We love Him and receive His love without 
thinking, but in great rejoicing. 

Then does it make no difference to us whether or not 
we are loved? yes! When we are loved with the 
same love our happiness is enlarged, not perfected. 
That is, every one who receives God's love sent out 
from us sends it back to us immediately by loving us. 

How can it be otherwise when it goes out to all per- 
ons? Are we not a part of the *'all persons" they are 
then loving? Our own Godlove which had been sent 
out from us thereby becomes consciously a part of us 
again, as it were. We have grown by giving, when 
others received. We experience a larger life than be- 
fore, but no purer. Richer but no more perfect. 

Our enlarged joy, then, is not in the thought that we 
are being loved. But it is in the gladness that others 
love also. We have a part in their loving just because 
they do love, and not because we are the ones they love. 
We thus lose nothing in the love of God going out from 
us regardless of where it falls. For His love is not 
divisible, and when others receive it and send it out 
we truly have a part in their ministry. This love is of 
God. And it is God, wherever it may dwell. 

When we have so wonderful a gift from God why 
shall we nurse and delight in human love which, how- 
ever pure and noble, must depend for happiness upon 
being loved in return for loving? And then it is but 



198 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

human happiness. It is imperfect. Shall we be satis- 
fied with the imperfect when the perfect is our inherit- 
ance, as sons of God? 

When we know that perfect happiness is based upon 
loving and not upon our consciousness of being loved, 
we must regard the truth in the light of God*s ideal for 
us as it is in Himself. That is, we shall reach it only 
when self has been crucified as He crucified Self. And 
because this is impossible to bear in all lines at all 
times while we are in the flesh, we live in perfect 
happiness only at times or in waves, if at all. At any 
rate the perfection of our happiness is in comparison 
to our perfect crucifixion of self in loving with all our 
heart, soul, and might, without regard to or thought 
of receiving love from others. 

And right here the Lord has apparently made a dif- 
ference between men and women. He has tenderly 
regarded her as "the weaker vessel" and has decreed 
happiness for her accordingly. For the sexes are as 
different spiritually as they are naturally. It is wom- 
an's nature to desire love. The more womanly she is 
the more her being cries out for love. To crucify self 
to that extent that she is insensible to love from others 
and only desires to love is almost beyond her endur- 
ance. It is indeed impossible in her experience unless 
it be by periods. She can not die to self so that she 
may have the experience at will, as man can. 

But the Lord is not impartial, and desires her to 
have happiness equal to his. Therefore He has supple- 
mented her incapacity because of the greater cruci- 
fixion required of her, by perfecting her happiness 
through obedience to man. She must truly renounce 
self just as man must, for perfect happiness. But she 
is given the privilege of renouncing to him and con- 



TEE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 199 

sciously delighting in his love, as she obeys his wish or 
will. She becomes strong in spirit and power in love 
and praise which only weakens man. 

It is because she is related to man as man is to 
Christ, as the scripture says. 1 Cor. 11 :3. While the 
love of God in man goes out to God with no thought of 
whether He returns it, man is conscious the while that 
Christ gave Himself for him, which makes the delight 
of such love possible. And he responsively obeys the 
spirit of Christ by giving himself for others. 

It was a condescension upon God's part to man's 
weakness that Christ was thus given and was cru- 
cified. Otherwise man would have to be crucified in 
the same manner to have such love. He may now have 
it through the mere consciousness and acceptance of 
Christ as his life, in obedience to Him. 

It is exactly so in God's kindness to woman. Be- 
cause He has placed in her a nature desiring so strong- 
ly to be loved that she can not at all times bear its com- 
plete crucifixion without giving up her very life, He 
has regarded her weakness from the first. "Thy desire 
shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." 
Gen. 3:16. Notwithstanding this was spoken before 
the redemption of Christ had appeared, it was after 
the redemption had been promised. See Gen. 3:15, 16. 
It was a recognition of a weakness in the flesh which 
still remains. It was recognized under the law and, 
later, under the Gospel. See Lev. 15:25-30. 1 Tim. 
2:15. 1 Cor. 7:11, 28. 

We do not say she must consciously desire human 
love, but, that love, coming even from God, must be 
received by her at least partially, through a human 
being, for her perfect happiness. And God, seeing 
this, has given her this privilege, just as He gives man 



200 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

the privilege of saving himself a crucifixion he can 
not bear, in a consciousness of receiving through 
Christ. 

And just as this love of God must go out from man, 
in obedience to the spirit of Christ in the flesh, so it 
is with woman. The love of God which she is priv- 
ileged to receive through man must go out to others in 
obedience to the spirit of the man who thus loves, and 
makes known his will. She becomes his help meet in 
spiritual things as she was created in natural. 

This is the underlying fact of the Bible teaching of 
blessings upon women in obedience to their husbands 
"in everything." Eph. 5 :24. Though the husband be 
wrong God stands behind the woman and blesses her 
anyhow when she obeys. Woman's relation to a spir- 
itual leader is the same, with the exception that a mar- 
ried woman's first duty is obedience to her husband, 
and afterwards obedience to her spiritual leader only 
in harmony with her husband's wishes. 

A spiritual leader can not say otherwise without con- 
tradicting the Bible. The one who dares to do so may 
have his perfect leadership under God questioned. His 
perfect wisdom will be manifest in revealing the way 
of conduct in full harmony with the Bible. The Bible 
is disputed, not because it is wrong, but because they 
who wish to lead in spiritual things have not God's wis- 
dom to know His revelation which has been given, but 
not clearly unfolded. 

Few women have learned the way of renunciation 
and crucifixion of self so that they may receive perfect 
happiness. Many ignore man as woman's spiritual 
head as Christ is man's Head. Many, thinking it is 
self which calls for love by way of a human being, pray 
for self-abnegation that this desire may be removed. 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 201 

And because the desire will persist in coming up again 
and again she condemns herself often. 

Because of their effeminacy in looking for happi- 
ness in response, men have known no better than 
women. A few men have dared to teach Paul's doc- 
trine of obedience. Some of these have been shamed 
by women who had the best of the argument in oppos- 
ing it from reason based upon the intelligence of the 
sexes in comparison. Such reasoning is a mistake and 
men would have to turn their backs upon Paul if it were 
the ground of instruction. Instead, it is a matter of 
perfect happiness of men and women, through cruci- 
fixion of self so that God may fill each. 

The happiness of His creatures underlies every com- 
mand of God. The commands pertaining to men and 
women form no exception. Why should they? And 
because their natures are different as they are the cru- 
cifixion of self is different in each. And yet they are 
so completely ''one flesh" that, in viewing their differ- 
ent ways of renunciation and crucifixion of self, we 
must find the secret of these in the oneness of the two 
sexes. 

That is to say, woman is the one "self" of the man 
who is composed of male and female, as noted later on. 
Although he is created as her head, she, as his **self," 
leads him. She led Adam. She has led men ever since. 
A man thinks he leads her but he does not. Every 
man knows every other man is led by the woman he 
loves, although none of them think they are. Each 
man thinks he himself is the only exception, but every 
other man knows he is no exception at all. And every 
woman knows her power to lead the man who loves 
her. Until she can lead him she doubts his love for her. 

Although we are speaking this way of men and 



202 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

women who dearly love each other, and we know that 
spiritual leadership is above human love, we shall not 
forget that the natural becomes lovable in all men and 
women when spiritual life is high and free, as noticed 
in the previous chapter. And God provides for the 
ideal of spirituality in all of His commandments. This 
same tendency of men to be led by women as their 
'*self," and the same tendency of women to lead men 
for her "self," is certain to be carried into the spiritual 
unless it is stopped in some way. And neither can have 
perfect happiness unless this is done. Therefore the 
commandment that Christ shall be his head, and he 
woman's and that her obedience shall be to him as his 
to Christ. 

It is self-renunciation and crucifixion. He renounces 
self in refusing to be led by her, no matter how pleas- 
ing in the natural. Many men deny her leading in the 
natural, but readily grant her leading in the spiritual 
for the very good reason that she is their superior in 
the spiritual. It is because they have but partially 
entered God's order. It is easier to depend upon her. 
They are not men, but boys, with wives for mothers. 
They have crucified self but little. It is pleasing to 
them in the natural to be led by "spiritual" women 

But God requires that they in their best shall be led 
by Christ alone. He holds them responsible accord- 
ingly. The perfect laws of spiritual life are inexorable 
in this. They can not be disregarded without suffer- 
ing of spiritual power and perfect happiness. In order 
for a man to have Godhke happiness in loving regard- 
less of a consciousness of being loved he must have 
an ear single and a spirit obedient to Christ alone, who 
made such love possible by giving Himself to man. And 
he must renounce her leading and crucify the natural 
pleasure of being led by her. 



TEE INFINITE^N TRINITY AND UNITY 203 

Herein is where the temptation in a married state 
overcomes many men who could have borne the cruci- 
fixion of self if they were not married. They are not 
overcome in a way that sin is imputed to them, but 
their pleasure is divided between the natural and the 
spiritual, therefore the latter is not so perfect as if 
their lives are single to the spiritual. 

In her crucifixion of self it is different. Her per- 
fect happiness is not dependent upon loving with no 
thought or consciousness of receiving love, as his is. 

He loves her as his self in the natural because she 
was made for his love. He was not created because 
she needed him, but she because he needed her. 1 Cor. 
11:9. And because she was created for his love God 
gave her a desire to be loved which made her perfect 
in her sphere. It is a "gift of the Spirit'' to her. A 
desire so strong that she can not bear the crucifixion 
of its removal, nor even be perfectly happy in renounc- 
ing the desire. Therefore, to repeat. He gives her the 
privilege of renouncing self, and bearing its crucifixion 
in another way. And that is, by giving up her inclina- 
tion and power to lead man, and obeying his wish im- 
plicitly, instead. 

It is not so easily done as we may think. She is 
quick and discerning beyond man, very often. Eve 
saw the merits of the fruit before Adam did. And 
when woman sees where man is blind no earthly power 
can keep her tongue still sometimes. The tongue of 
a woman, no matter how "spiritual" the man thinks 
she is, is the hardest thing God has to control then, 
unless it be the mind which prompts the tongue to 
speak. And because He so often fails to do it we sel- 
dom see women who are perfectly happy. 

It is because self is not renounced and crucified — the 



204 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY . 

self which had ruled him and her. Because her intui- 
tions are ahead of man's reason or foresight, and have 
always proved "true" she simply can not keep from 
telling them, and the man who should have listened to 
God alone gladly hears her as God's voice to him. And 
because they proved "true" he is glad she led him and 
she is glad he followed. 

And so goes spiritual life in a common way. Neither 
learn the "true" God has for them both in His way. 
The true love of God coming in like floods of heaven, 
because self is renounced. In him through renuncia- 
tion of her leading when it is to be had so much easier 
than God's less pleasant voice in the natural, just as 
in the beginning. She in her renunciation and cruci- 
fixion of self in leading him in that which appears so 
perfect to her and so superior to what he sees. And 
because God's happiness and love does not fill them on 
account of the self which is retained it is impossible 
for them to manifest His power upon earth. 

And yet Heaven's happiness often does come into 
both men and women in experiences which seem per- 
fect, at times. Then, in women, it is invariably in rap- 
turous obedience to a man she loves in the natural, or 
in the spirit of holy obedience in reverence of a man 
as her spiritual leader. 

Not that women have not such happiness indepen- 
dent of men whom they obeyed. But they have had an 
obedient spirit to men when they were happy. And 
their happiness has been crystallized in actual obedi- 
ence to the wish or will of men. Let men and women 
who are capable of analysis of the facts attest to it. 
And men will witness that, on the contrary, they have 
had their greatest happiness when they walked as 
kings or gods before their God, yielding reverence to 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 205 

none but Him, and shedding abroad to others the love 
of God in their hearts, regardless of where it fell, or 
whether it was given in return. 

We do not mean to teach that the spheres of men 
and women should be so distinct that they shall not con- 
sult with each other or that she may not advise him. 
This would be to overturn customs which have grown 
with the advance of civilization and ascent into the 
higher life, to the mutual advantage of both. And the 
higher the spiritual life the more dependent will each 
be upon the other to accomplish God's larger purposes. 

But man, in walking close to God and entering into 
the most perfect happiness possible, must walk in- 
dependent of her except as he loves her and directs her 
as his "helpmeet. And her perfect happiness shall be 
in reverencing him and heeding his will, (Eph. 5 :22, 
33,) while she refrains from teaching or advising him, 
except according to his request. 1 Cor. 14:34. 

Lest any fear we are teaching the worship of men, 
let it be regarded that all we are speaking of has no ref- 
erence to the perfection or place of men as being of su- 
perior mold or station. There is no place for such dis- 
tinction, or of preference in the kingdom of heaven. In- 
stead, ''He that would be great among you let him be 
your servant." 

This being true some other reason must be found 
than superiority, for the relative places men and women 
are made to occupy, throughout the Bible, in the king- 
dom of heaven upon earth. 

Anyway, superiority in the graces which we natur- 
ally think of as belonging to heaven, are in her, rather 
than in him. Gentleness of manner, quickness of sym- 
pathy, responsiveness in love, correctness through in- 
tuition, tenderness of conscience, winning in disposition 



206 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

etc, etc. These, in many men are apparently offset by 
mere hardihood, ruggedness, and strength, hidden be- 
neath a harsh and rough exterior not adapted to win- 
ning the love of souls to them. 

But God's arrangement in this respect has in view 
the renunciation and crucifixion of self in both m^en 
and women. For this must be perfect in heaven, and 
the nearer it is perfected upon earth the larger the 
individuality of character now formed for heaven. 

When this is understood saints will cease to rebel 
against and criticise the writings of Paul, which only 
emphasize definitely what is taught throughout the 
scriptures. And they will enter a happiness they have 
not received when they joyfully obey. 

For it is self-renunciation. The more superior she 
is to him in all natural gifts the more self-renunciation 
it requires of him to turn a deaf ear to her and hear 
God only. And the more self-renunciation it requires 
upon her part to hold her tongue and smile in approval 
when she sees him going headlong into error from 
which she might save him. When she keeps quiet and 
obedient and prays to God He will save him. 

The church will not go to ruin if she ceases to 
"speak" in the assembly. By refraining she can grow 
into a praying angel who may accomplish more than 
the speech of a score of wise women. It is power in 
the Unseen for her. Man's renunciation of self to hear 
God's voice in preference to hers will be as great. 

The more manly or gallant the man and the more 
womanly and capable the woman, the more each will 
have difficulty in renouncing self in relation to each 
other. He to turn a deaf ear to her wisdom and she 
to hold a dumb tongue from saving him from error. 
The victory won by each will be accordingly greater. 



THE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 207 

He can not crucify self in her way nor she in his. Nor 
can he have perfect happiness in her way nor she in his. 

The least happy among women, regardless of their 
claims, are those who contend with Paul, and set him 
aside as hard hearted and unsympathetic and unappre- 
ciative of woman's talents or ignorant of her modern 
sphere in the church. And the most happy are those 
who receive his words as of the Holy Spirit. 

For indeed it is the tenderness and gentleness of the 
Holy Spirit to womankind which permits her cruci- 
fixion of self, and therefore greatest happiness, in this 
way, and which saves her from the harder road of 
men in self -crucifixion. That is, a road that would be 
harder for her at all times than for him, and at times 
absolutely impossible, by reason of the rugged way he 
alone is enabled to tread. But his love must surely go 
out to her strong and constant, as Christ's comes to 
him. As Christ gave His life in gladness from love 
which was shed upon all men regardless of whether 
they received and returned love, so shall God's perfect 
love in man be the same to every woman, whether he 
experiences love in return or not. 

No man has reached the happiness there is for him 
now in the Lord until love like this has been his experi- 
ence. Some do not reach it because self is not suflfi- 
ciently crucified. But it is the Lord's order for man, 
as obedience is His order for woman. His freedom and 
Godlikeness is signified in a walk with head bared and 
free in the worship of God. Her obedience to him by 
her worship of God with head veiled. 1 Cor. 11 :4, 5. 

Paul illustrates this spiritual truth by nature. Ver. 
14, 15. But in the natural her hair, which is per- 
manent, and has its meaning in all women just the 
same, whether they are spiritual or not, has not the 



208 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

significance of a special veil. The veil, also being arti- 
ficial and temporary, symbolizes that her place of 
obedience, or of crucifixion of self in that way, is but 
temporary. In heaven self will be out, independent 
of him. 

Far and away back of this divine arrangement lies 
God's order of creation of man in His own likeness 
and image. In that ''image" "man" was created "male 
and female." It required both to form the "man" who 
became in the "image" of God. The likeness to God 
in both is readily seen. 

In their power to create beings in their own image. 
In this creation being through her, as by the Son God 
created all things. In her suffering in the flesh, for 
Christ suffered in the flesh. In their being "one flesh" 
as the Father and Son are one Being. In her creation 
from the bosom of Adam as the Son came from "the 
bosom of the Father." In her peculiar power to reveal 
the tenderness and wisdom of the man she understands, 
to others who see but the harshness of the human crust 
in him, as he can not. For so the Son revealed the 
Father whom the people regarded in terror before. In 
the woman's representation of the "self" of the man 
who loves her. This was illustrated in Adam, who pre- 
ferred death with her after he saw she had trans- 
gressed, rather than life without her. 

For, while she was deceived "in the transgression" 
"Adam was not deceived," but disobeyed with his eyes 
open. 1 Tim. 2:14. He believed in her, notwithstand- 
ing. Perhaps in some way he had a vague feeling of 
a possible redemption from their death. At any rate 
his belief and love for her was but the likeness of 
God's love for His Son, representing His own Self, 
even after He had renounced and crucified Self. For 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 209 

when the Son became sin for us (Isa. 53 :10. 2 Cor. 5 : 
21) the Father went into the depths of hell (Acts 2 :27) 
with Him before He would permit Him to be separated 
from Him, and to die, except as He died for others. 
Matt. 27:42. And the Father is that true to all who 
believe in Him. 

When we thus behold the completeness of man and 
woman as the image of God, each supplementing the 
other in representing God's completeness in His own 
Being, to the world, is it any wonder Paul says, "neither 
is the man without the woman, neither the woman 
without the man, in the Lord?" And, considering their 
different natures and the different spheres to which 
each is adapted, is it surprising that perfect renun- 
ciation of self and its crucifixion are reached by each, 
in a different way? 

Not that their salvation is reached differently, for 
both alike are saved through belief in Christ. But 
because Christ represents self-renunciation, as a life 
in the flesh, may not each in their own way, according 
to their respective natures, enter the fulness of His joy 
in their own self-renunciation and crucifixion? 

Not that we should establish an order by our own 
reasoning, but when we see the order which God has 
established pertaining to each, so beautifully consistent 
with His desire for our perfect happiness, is not rea- 
son glorified in our worship of His wisdom? 

When we have the proper attitude towards oppos- 
ing forces permitting self-renunciation in love we may 
know that husbands whose wives are self-willed may 
develop character for heaven by overcoming, such as 
would be impossible had they wives like angels. And 
bright and good wives with stupid and surly husbands 
may almost become angels while upon earth by re- 



210 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

nouncing self and living in obedience to them. Instead 
of prejudices and divisions in churches because of mis- 
understandings and antagonisms, there would be a de- 
velopment of individuals for eternity such as would 
be impossible when all were of a like mind in the 
natural. 

These are homely spiritual facts illustrated continu- 
ally in lives about us ; and because of self love entering 
where only the love of God should abide the people of 
the Lord are imbeciles compared to the men and women 
of strength and power they should be. Upon every 
hand this weakness is apparent and is fostered in the 
very root of our worship of God. 

In pastor and people seeking to build up their own 
church self instead of shedding God's love wherever 
people hunger for its ministry, without thought of 
receiving, or of an increase in the church roll, or what 
the annual church report will show compared to the 
previous years. Even prayers are for self instead of 
**for all men everywhere" as the scriptures teach. 

Never yet has a person experienced perfect happi- 
ness in praying for self, because it can not be done in 
the fulness of God's love. In the midst of Christ's 
greatest trials when His soul was "sorrowful unto 
death" the flesh led Him to pray for self, but He imme- 
diately rose above His human weakness and said, "Not 
my will, but thine, be done." 



CHAPTER XI. 
"Our God is a consuming fire." 

We have repeatedly referred to the impossibility of 
men and women being able to bear complete crucifixion 
of self, while in the flesh, to that degree that they may 
live in the body and yet be as free to move it at will 
as Christ was, after His resurrection. To change its 
appearance, or to pass with it from the visible to the 
invisible, and back again, or to transport it anywhere 
regardless of walls or worlds of matter intervening. 
It was necessary for Christ to die before He came into 
such perfection in the natural body, and the disciple 
is not above his Master. 

And yet, in speaking this way we do not place im- 
possibilities upon God. The only thing impossible with 
Him is to be inconsistent with His own unity. Even 
though His unity of all things does not appear now 
while its manifestation is being worked out through 
the ages. His spiritual laws consistent with Himself 
must control things and persons in the meantime. And 
to the best of our light man, who certainly has all the 
weakness in the human which Christ bore in the flesh, 
can not hope to be freed from this weakness without 
some kind of physical death. If Christ, notwithstand- 
ing His perfect union with the Father, could not be- 
come perfected in the flesh without physical death 
how can we ? 

And yet every generation has those in their midst 
who do not expect to die, because they are assured 
that "Christ hath abolished death." We should not 



212 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

discourage such, for doubtless one may walk so close 
with God as to give Him pleasure to translate him 
without death. And even those whose physical body 
is left behind may have had a hope so bright that to 
them the change is not death, but merely the passing 
into a greater life. But neither of these may manifest 
the perfection in the body which Christ did after His 
resurrection. 

They may not have such an experience without the 
absence of self, to that measure that God is really 
manifest in their flesh as He was in Christ's body. In 
the brighter days in the Spirit which are at hand we 
need not be surprised if translation occurs frequently, 
and if it becomes a common experience for Christians 
to pass out of the body as naturally and triumphantly 
as the butterfly emerges from the chrysalis in which it 
had been bound. But neither of these indicate the 
freedom Christ entered through physical death. For 
crucifixion of self has not been perfected in any, as 
in Him. 

As they become more common and triumphant, how- 
ever, there will be souls here and there who are pressed 
with a burning, holy desire for a greater victory over 
the flesh than that. They will reach out for such a 
crucifixion of the flesh that God will appear through 
them in His power and love. They will somehow feel 
that Christ's death purchased this freedom for them 
so that they do not have to die to receive it. 

Some may be pursued with a fanatacism that will 
attempt such a crucifixion in the flesh as to bring their 
physical death prematurely, or that will derange their 
mind. This will be a mistake. The desire for God's 
perfect manifestation of Himself through them is right 
and holy. But the faith which lays hold upon it through 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 213 

Christ should also perceive that it may require so great 
a crucifixion of self to permit the life of Christ to come 
into them in the fulness of His perfection, as they can 
not bear. Therefore why should they hasten their 
death foolishly? 

And yet, while they can not bear the crucifixion of 
self sufficiently to at once receive the perfection which 
He has surely purchased for them, God, who permits 
the desire, is merciful and wise and loving, willing and 
able to satisfy every pure longing in our hearts. It is 
simply a matter of our reaching it in His way. And 
if crucifixion alone fails us of opening the way into 
His fulness while we are in the flesh, may it not be 
possible there is some other way which we have not 
seen? That there is a gate to open, which stands at 
the end of the road of the crucifixion we are able to 
bear? And that there is a key or a knock that will 
permit the gate to swing that we may enter God, and 
that God, who says He is knocking also, may enter us? 
Indeed, considering that Christ has borne crucifixion 
for us, is it not possible that this gate is along our 
pathway, and that we have often passed it with eyes 
blinded in the hurt of crucifixion we bear, which He 
has really borne for us ? 

When we read that "our God is a consuming fire," 
and that ''God is love," is it too great a thing for us 
to hope that His love may come into us in such a way 
as to consume the self which we have so signally failed 
to crucify? Indeed, only the love of God can consume 
self, crucified or not crucified. A perfect work may 
be done in us only, however, when we have perfect 
happiness in His love. When men love everything and 
every person and God, in obedience to the spirit of 
Christ which makes such love possible, with no thought 



214 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

of receiving love in return. And w^hen women love 
likewise in obedience to the spirit of such men. The 
power of such love both to consume self and to mani- 
fest God in the flesh, we have truly failed to either 
demonstrate or to realize. 

Consuming love sees nothing unlovable in men and 
women who quarrel and hate and are filthy and fleshly 
and vile. But it sees a nature in them which is to be 
overcome by God's love within them, and when over- 
come works a heavenly character not possible without 
the ugliness to overcome. The more hopeless the per- 
son the more eagerly perfect love reaches out to help 
them, because in them is there a possibility of forming 
an individuality in heaven, as noted in chapter six, 
more than in any one else, because of the overcoming 
required. 

It is not the improvement in individuals, apparent 
to the eye, which should give us the greatest encourage- 
ment. Perfect love sees beneath the crust and knows 
it is the overcoming of each person's inner self which 
has virtue. And the person who is ungainly or awk- 
ward or unfortunate is usually forced to overcome 
much self by reason of the slights and knocks of their 
fellows, far more than the beautiful and skilful and 
favored ones of earth. Perfect love goes alike to the 
latter, but they usually receive less of it because they 
are not so hungry for it. They are filled with human 
love and favor such as those whom we naturally think 
less fortunate are not given. They are the really for- 
tunate. 

It is the same regarding things. Consuming love 
goes out in delight and embraces the naturally revolt- 
ing and embittering circumstances and things the same 
as the clean and inspiring and beautiful. And it is 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 215 

enlarged more in contact with the former than with 
the latter, because the absence of human favor leaves 
it open to receive more of us, as it were, than the lat- 
ter, which is surfeited with human praise. 

The lover of nature sees in every green thing of 
shrub, vine, moss, or tree, vegetable life, each express- 
ing itself by a different exterior. He can spare none 
of them. As a landscape artist he sees everything 
equally beautiful, each in its place, just as the painting 
artist regards every shade of pigment equally indis- 
pensable to bring out a varied perfect picture. 

Or as he studies a single tree all parts contribute 
to the harmonious whole. The rough, warty, scaly 
bark, the seams softened by cobwebs, the gnarled trunk 
and limbs, the scars of conflicts waged and won, the 
fading leaves and the fresh, growing ones, the buds, 
the flowers, and the ripening fruit, are all equally 
beautiful to him who loves the life of the tree. For he 
perceives it in the crumbling bark or the buried root, 
as well as in the color of the bloom and the whispering 
of leaves. 

Likewise is the church of God loved by the soul ar- 
tist who perceives God*s life in it everywhere, as in a 
tree of His planting. In each individual is the perfect 
life which he sees just the same, whether countenances 
are sad or glad. Or whether faces are fair or brown 
or black, smooth or wrinkled. Or in forms erect, 
stooped, or crawling. Or steps firm or halting, or 
hands soft and flexible or hard and stiff. And if brows 
are scowling or lips sour or actions crusty he sees they 
are but the roughened bark or the chafed limbs of the 
tree, hiding the same life which in another member or 
branch appears in sweet smiles and fair brows and 
courtly manners. He sees the same perfection in all 



216 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

alike, each in his sphere, according as his eye sees in 
faith the picture the Great Artist is working out. 

Many see confusion upon every hand, and are nerv- 
ous and faultfinding because they see not the perfect 
life within all of God's children. Or the perfect se- 
quence of circumstances and events contributing to a 
grand final unity in Him. They denounce much which 
is done in honest hearts as being of Satan. They stamp 
and cry **God is a God of order and not of confusion," 
because they see ^'confusion." It may not be confusion 
at all. An act which is momentarily confusing may 
be seen, at the end of a month to have been harmonious 
with the month's progress. Or the month of confusion 
is in harmony, seen at the end of a year. And the 
year which is confusion is perhaps the key to a beau- 
tiful harmony at the end of a generation. And the 
generation, when it was thought God had abandoned 
the earth, may be seen, at the end of Time, to have 
been but a part of the perfect harmony at last appear- 
ing in God's unity of all things. 

All nervousness comes from narrowness of view, and 
resenting v/hat appears to us as confusion. It is self 
which takes the narrow view, centering all things 
there. Thus some physicians define hysterics as "self- 
ishness gone to seed." We fear because of our limited 
comprehension. Let God's perfect love consume the 
eye of self and there will be such an absence of fear 
as to enable us to bring harmony instead of confusion 
into the present which appears. Harmony of spirit 
into an assembly of opposing forces. Harmony of pros- 
perity where opposition is wrecking success. Harmony 
of health into sick bodies whose members are warring 
one with another. For such is the power of perfect 
love which is shed abroad into the hearts of others 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 217 

without regard to self, even as our Father in heaven 
has shed His love abroad into our hearts. And the 
more forbidding to the natural the more receptive to 
God's love because there is more hungriness for it. 
The natural was starved that the eternal might find 
lodgment. 

Turned upon conditions within ourselves consuming 
love embraces the disease and the pain and the weak- 
ness which is so distressing to self, and caresses it 
with as much fondness as the naturally more perfect 
parts of the body and mind. The more severe the pain 
and filthy the disease and unattractive the appearance 
the more perfect love laughs in praise to God for it. 
It sees thereby an opportunity of overcoming self, 
which is in the weakness, and of forming an excellence 
of individuality in heaven which would be impossible 
in its absence. 

For indeed was it not self we had been praying to 
have overcome? And as we suffer pain in its cruci- 
fixion why should not God's perfect love within us laugh 
at every pain, seeing the work progressing so beauti- 
fully? And why should not the hated, despised, pain- 
racked part of our body receive hungrily such love 
with an embrace that the love consumes every part of 
the human weakness? Then, as the very self which 
hated the weakness is consumed, why shall not 
Heaven's health and glory come in instead? 

In this way, taking our bodies and minds in parts 
at a time, as we suffer only in parts at the same time, 
who will say it is not possible to have self so consumed 
by God's love that He may yet manifest Himself in 
these human bodies? Or rather, in bodies received 
gradually from heaven as self and the human is con- 
sumed? And when our body and mind are changed 



218 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

through and through in a transformation from self 
within to God within, where is the limit of God*s power 
through us? It must be done gradually, part by part, 
as it were, as we suffer in the flesh. But who will say 
it can not be done? 

As weakness after weakness is consumed with God's 
love and His perfection takes its place we have gift 
after gift of the Spirit to remove the same weakness 
from others. 

Is life too short, seeing there are so many attributes 
in the mind of self to be overcome, in addition to every 
nerve and muscle and bone in the body, in this trans- 
formation? Not when we may lengthen the span of 
man's years cut short by sin. And every perfection in 
the body received from heaven is incorruptible if we 
keep Heaven's life flowing through it. 

It was Heaven's life flowing through the three 
friends of Daniel which prevented their bodies and 
even garments from being singed by the fire which 
slew the men who cast them into the furnace. And 
which made the lions fear to touch Daniel. And which 
kept Methuselah in health almost a thousand years. 

When we are healed in a part of our body or mind 
w^e should thereafter use that part with a joy and 
gladness in ministering to others which floods away 
all fear of overdoing, or all desire of self for apprecia- 
tion of our ministry. 

What right have we who have seen the redemption 
of Christ and have known the record of God's wonders 
through the ages, as they had not, to come short of 
the fulness of God which they enjoyed? And why 
have we not done it in the ordinary walks of life, to 
say nothing of the great trials wherein we fail? Be- 
cause we fear, or lack faith, which is the same. And 



TEE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 219 

we fear because we lack perfect love. We are not 
made perfect in love or fear would go out and faith 
come in. That is the whole story. 

We, no doubt, have a much clearer understanding of 
these things than Moses and Abraham and Elijah had. 
But we understand so many things of science in the 
natural that our scientific reason stands in the way of 
Heaven's reason. Our eyes are so much established 
in the things of the Seen that the Unseen is less real 
to us. 

When once the truth burns into us of how little of 
God's consuming love we have manifested, or of per- 
fect happiness have experienced, as tested according 
to our spirit of giving, need we wonder that so little 
of His heaven is seen upon earth? And that here and 
there through the ages a man stands out in bold relief 
because he has permitted God to go out to humanity 
through him? But shall not children of God, in this 
age of marvelous progress of the world, accept the 
importance of manifesting God in as great a manner 
as He has ever appeared through men? Is there any 
reason why we shall permit lone individuals of former 
ages to manifest Him in a greater way than should be 
common amongst us in this age of greater spiritual 
enlightenment than has ever appeared? 

If God, in His wisdom, has permitted blindness to 
dim truths from us which He is now disclosing, shall 
we be slow at receiving them? Have we not reached 
a plane in human advancement that we can enter, with- 
out stumbling, into a spirit of His greater love than 
men have heretofore been able to receive? 

We shall enter it in the joy of children learning to 
walk for the very pleasure of it and not for reward. 
We shall live happy in a world where we know that 



220 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

in all of the Seen of every character there lies a little 
of the Unseen which shall endure in beauty forever. 
And that the Unseen which shall at last appear most 
glorious is but the Seen reduced to its rarest possible 
substance. 

To illustrate : An immense building may be reduced 
through fire to a trifle of smoke and ashes. Or a huge 
stack of straw or debris to a little mould for the gar- 
den. So is the eternal in the midst of every thing we 
see. It is, in a person, a tiny spark of life too rare to 
be seen by the eye or too light to be weighed by man's 
judgment, somewhere in the midst of a huge human 
body of great swelling words and much stirring life. 
Or it may be a mere influence, as an apple in a boy*s 
hand, or an artist's painting which costs its thousands, 
or a foul deed which makes men shudder. 

The Unseen Eternal, however, be it ever so insignifi- 
cant, is in everything in the Seen. The latter's crea- 
tion were useless otherwise. And it is always suflS- 
ciently there to justify the existence of the Seen, no 
matter what a bulk of apparent waste and incongruity 
there is in the latter. When things appear unseemly 
or go wrong all about us and appear hard and unrecep- 
tive, fear enters our hearts if we do not see with God's 
consuming love. 

We think the Holy Spirit is "grieved" and we feel 
badly. His "grief," if any, is in us that we can not 
see in perfect faith. There is no grief in the Holy 
Spirit except in ourselves, that we shall consider. It 
is not our place to see Him grieved in others. It is 
our place to see He is not grieved within us, and when 
we have such love as to do this all will appear beau- 
tiful and right, and our love will bring it so. For it 
is "faith which worketh by love" within us. The Holy 



TEE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 221 

Spirit, outside of persons, and in His place in the God- 
head has not had grief since the redemption of man- 
kind was ''finished/' 

He recognizes Christ's work as perfect, and only- 
re joices. He is the Spirit of Self-renunciation, and 
through the renunciation of God of Himself He, to- 
gether with Christ and the Father, has no Self to be 
offended within Himself. For He is the Spirit which 
considers others alone, and loves them as Christ and 
the Father loves. Therefore, when we are sad and 
grieved because we think the Holy Spirit is being 
grieved with men and women and circumstances, let 
us know that it is Him in us which is grieved, and 
not apart from us that we may know. It is self in 
us that we are beholding things through, instead of 
being united with God in such love as forgets self. 

Or, when we think the Holy Spirit is being grieved 
with other persons let us know assuredly it is self in 
us beholding the self in others which makes it appear 
so. Let God's consuming love within us behold only 
this same love in the other one and he changes into 
rapturous beauty and righteousness as by magic. There 
is no grief then, but love which consumes it in both us 
and him. For that is the way God loves, and it is the 
way He shall consume all opposition to Himself and 
to all things and circumstances, when He in His love 
shall "be all and in all." 

By faith, when we love as God loves, and see the per- 
fect hidden in all things, we delight in it before it 
appears as the florist delights in the filth and bog and 
crawling things whose beauty will come to light in the 
blue or yellow of a few petals upon a flower stem. It 
is largely in the florist's sheer joy in the filthy task of 
working in slime and decay in anticipation of the 



222 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

flower which shall appear, that it rewards him gener- 
ously with smiling face and knowing converse. Like- 
wise, when our hope in the imperfect which appears 
lives in great joy of the perfect life which shall appear 
in the final unfolding, we have power to bring that to 
light quickly which, under disapproval and condemna- 
tion should remain in cover and darkness. 

What happiness we shall find in living upon earth 
with such love! When in everything we see there is 
something of the Eternal which we can help to bring 
to light by seeing it in gladness and faith. It is like 
having a part in the eternal creation by working with 
the things at our hand. Indeed it is this very thing. 

In every person there is that which we may bring 
to the surface which will live eternally, by covering 
and saturating them with God's perfect love. Or if 
they reject the love and become an obstacle whose in- 
fluence is evil, the person who overcomes an aversion 
to them has a life enriched for eternity through the 
overcoming. Not a person or thing of good and evil 
can fail to contribute to the eternal good of some one. 

Then if, in everything we behold or come into con- 
tact with through the natural senses, there is a portion 
of the perfect eternal, in what way shall this perfect 
appear and the dross be consumed ? Herein we see the 
necessity of the Bible teaching of hell, and no amount 
of sentimental reasoning can set it aside. If there is no 
hell as a fire to consume imperfection, then imperfec- 
tion shall always confront us in varied aspect, from 
that which merely displeases us, to the stench of all 
which is devilish. And however little we may know 
about the details of what the Bible calls hell fire, we 
can see the general place such a fact must occupy be- 
fore God can be "all and in all." For all opposition 
to Him must be consumed, as by fire. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 223 

In the final consuming God Himself is probably the 
"fire" which consumes. This is not the fire of hell, for 
in the end both death and hell themselves are cast into a 
"lake of fire/' "This is the second death/' Rev. 20 :14. 
It is the destruction of all life not destroyed by hell, 
and of all not 'Vritten in the Book of Life." Ver. 15. 
The destruction of all life which is for self. It is the 
final death of all opposition to God. 

Why should it be thought that life exists eternally 
in hell, when hell itself is cast into a lake of fire? And 
why should this be called "the second death" if it is 
not a more complete death than hell claimed, or if it is 
not the death of hell itself? And is it not implied that 
the "lake of fire" shall destroy all life except those 
whose names are written in the Book of Life? That 
is, all life which is not born of God? 

True enough, in verse ten we read that "the beast 
and the false prophet" "shall be tormented day and 
night for ever and ever." But it is probably univer- 
sally thought that a more literal translation, which is 
correct, would be not "forever and ever," as we under- 
stand it, but "to the ages of the ages." And what is 
that but the "age" to which all ages lead, when God 
shall "be all and in all?" What else indeed? The fire 
of hell can never be "quenched." It must be consumed 
in the end. 

We shall not fail to notice the clear distinction the 
Bible makes between hell itself and the "lake of fire." 
They can not be the same when the former, together 
with death, shall be cast into the latter. The smaller 
is always cast into the greater. Then death is con- 
sumed by something greater also. 

Hell is prepared for individuals — "the devil and his 



224 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

angels." Matt. 25 :41. "The lake of fire," after con- 
suming everything cast into it, contains no individu- 
als. A "lake" as a symbol signifies the lack of indi- 
viduality in what composes it. For all things run to- 
gether in a lake. If fed by a thousand streams not 
one retains its individuality. 

Therefore, when we are told that "our God is a con- 
suming fire" we can see that nothing can so well de- 
scribe the perfect eternal in all things not having life 
as individuals, equal to this very expression,- — "the 
lake of fire," when all the dross of imperfection which 
we see is consumed. That is, every influence and every 
power in all things which appear, which are eternal, 
when the imperfect is destroyed, form together one 
very great perfect influence which is like God in per- 
fection, but like a lake in the aggregate, with no indi- 
viduality. 

For truly there are impersonal influences which are 
eternal, in the midst of things all about us. And in 
the end, when the eternal shall be separated from the 
temporal, the former must exist in some way which 
may be likened unto a "lake." Nothing could express 
it more simply. And yet we can comprehend no farther 
perhaps. We cannot probably fathom the place that 
"lake" may occupy after it has consumed death and 
hell. Who knows but that out of it may be formed 
new worlds? 

In speaking of hell as a place prepared for individu- 
als — the devil and his angels — we must have a clear 
view of the salvation purchased by God through Christ. 
For what is saved with His life hell can not destroy, 
nor shall the "lake of fire" try to destroy it. It is life 
of His own life. Christ Himself said that "God sent 
not His Son into the world to condemn the world ; but 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 225 



that the world through Him might be saved." Jno. 
3:17. 

That such salvation is more than a mere opportunity, 
but is an actual necessity, we know from the scrip- 
tures that *'the Son of man is come to seek and to save 
that which is lost." Luke 19 :10. "I came not to judge 
the world, but to save the world." Jno. 12 :47. ''Who- 
soever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be 
saved." Acts 2:21. *'As I live, saith the Lord, every 
knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess 
to God." Rom. 14:11. 

Therefore, before we may admit the final loss of any- 
thing in this world shall we not reverently inquire 
whether the Son accomplished the purpose for which 
He was sent? Shall we be afraid to take these words 
of scripture as absolute, or must we modify them by 
bringing other scriptures from their contexts, against 
them, to qualify them? 

While we have the privilege of "comparing spiritual 
things with spiritual" (1 Cor. 2:13) is the salvation 
of our Lord Jesus Christ to be compared with another 
spiritual truth? If there is a truth greater than His 
salvation is it not Love? And if we place salvation 
alongside of Love is it not consistent with God's love 
which created all things that all things be finally saved ? 

Is it not the spirit of self and not of perfect Love 
which has interpreted scripture to a human under- 
standing, whereby salvation of all things has not been 
perfected in Christ? Have we not been so irreverent 
regarding God's perfect work in salvation that we may 
well pause and see if the Holy Spirit, with self ex- 
cluded, may not bring us more perfect light through 
the scriptures which we have thought taught other- 
wise? 



226 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

When we have the further statement that, after the 
perfect work of Christ was accomplished, God is still 
"not willing that any should perish, but that all should 
come to repentance" (2 Pet. 3:9), may we not inquire 
if His will is not strong enough to prevail in the mat- 
ter? Therefore, before admitting failure of His pur- 
pose or will in the slightest particular let us accept 
God's work through Christ as perfect. 

It is not the God which the spirit in men of the 
strongest and keenest feeling are seeking if we admit 
otherwise. They must have a Christ who became a 
perfect Savior for all. Who is not going to save but 
who has saved. Not one for whom He died may perish. 
If so He would have failed in His purpose that far, 
and in His will. When we believe all of this we do no 
violence to either the scripture or to God's consistency 
with His own being of Love, or to His justice to Him- 
self and to His creation. 

But except individuals personally accept His salva- 
tion they can not be saved as individual beings. That 
in them which is the perfect eternal shall be saved in 
very truth, but not as a person. They shall not have 
a personal consciousness of their salvation. 

Not having it in this life, how shall they have it when 
this shall end? They may not enter life as life, here- 
after. That is, as individuals consciously possessing 
any life whatever. The perfect in them has eternal 
existence but not eternal life, as individuals know life. 

Each person becomes an individual being with a 
conscious eternal life in them by confessing the Christ, 
the Son of God, as their Savior. They take upon them- 
selves personality for eternity right now, by recogniz- 
ing this. Is it not simple and reasonable thus? "He 
that believeth on me hath everlasting life," says Christ. 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 227 

That is, the soul which has indeed been saved through 
God's renunciation of Himself in Christ, by acknowl- 
edging this salvation within him, changes from an im- 
personal influence or power which shall exist forever 
by reason of his salvation, into a distinct individual, 
with a personality which is consciously his own. And 
this personality makes him a son of God, joint heir 
with Christ of all things of the Father. For in recog- 
nizing his own salvation he recognizes the same per- 
fect life within him which constitutes Christ's perfec- 
tion. 

Children believe in God in spirit until they are taught 
to disbelieve. They are individualities in Him until 
they deny this individuality by denying Him and choos- 
ing for self. Then they become dead in sin, or separa- 
tion from God. 

When souls know good and evil and do not renounce 
self in the acceptance of Christ as their Savior they 
are angels of the devil, for whom hell is prepared. 
For they are individuals who live for self. They never 
become any other kind until they do renounce self, 
therefore can not be saved as individuals. 

How can they, when self must be destroyed before 
the saved soul within them can enter God's perfect 
heaven ? They shall be saved, but only as an influence, 
or impersonal power, after hell has consumed all of 
self which it can. In common with the perfect Eternal 
in all other persons and things which Christ has re- 
deemed they shall, with them, unite as a "lake of fire," 
or with this **lake," to become an impersonal Presence 
in a way which may perhaps not be revealed to man 
in this life. 

This **lake" must in some way be a product of our 
God who is a consuming fire, and it has doubtless been 



228 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

forming for ages. God's will that "all shall come to 
repentance" is not thwarted, according to this manner, 
but repentance of many comes too late to form within 
them an individality as a life for heaven. All saved 
souls not written in "the Book of Life" in this life 
repent too late for a personal life in heaven, there- 
fore have their part in the "lake" of impersonality 
there. 

That is, those who repented in time to have their 
names written in the Book of Life, and to do works 
which were recorded in the other "books," were judged 
as individual beings, each with a conscious distinct per- 
sonality. But those whose repentance was too late for 
record in the Book of life, not having called until death 
in the body had passed upon them, and who therefore 
could have no works to their credit, even of confession, 
could have no individuality there. They could form 
merely a part of a "lake" composed of the impersonal 
Eternity, but not as eternal lives. 

We cannot even in this life conceive of life apart 
from existence in individuals, and how can we think of 
it existing hereafter apart from individuality ? And if 
individuals in this life fail to accept eternal life before 
death comes upon them what opportunity is there to 
accept it after the first death of the present life? But 
because there is no opportunity for the eternal to live 
in them hereafter as life, need we conclude it does not 
live at all, without individuality ? 

And it must be considered that just as to us there ap- 
pears two kinds of salvation — an impersonal salvation 
of that which is eternal in each person, and a salvation 
of the person as an individual — there are too kinds of 
repentance. Paul recognizes this when he says, "Godly 
sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be re- 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 229 

pented of : but the sorrow of the world worketh death.*' 
2 Cor. 7 :10. No doubt in hell every one will turn from 
self in disgust, and this turning is repentance. But it 
is too late for them to be saved as individualities, each 
with a conscious personality as a son of God. And yet, 
all do "come to repentance." 

Lest all of this concerning hell and the ''lake of fire" 
be regarded as mere speculation beyond the power of 
man to know, let it be considered whether or no it is 
consistent with our idea of a God of all love and ten- 
derness, and of justice to Himself. Whether it be con- 
sistent with our own highest and best ideas of right, 
as compared with our former views regarding them. 

For we must remember we dare not brush away our 
own ideas of right when we would magnify our great 
God. Man is created in His image and may have a cer- 
tain knowledge of Him. He will have this certain 
knowledge through only two ways which work to- 
gether. And this is by knowing himself and being 
absolutely true to himself. When he does this he knows 
God. 

For when he knows himself he knows Him of whom 
he is the image. And when he is absolutely true to 
himself he is true to God for the same reason. All ig- 
norance of God comes from ignorance of one's own be- 
ing or from being false to one's self. Eve did not know 
herself else she could not have been deceived with the 
temptation. Adam was not true to himself, else he 
would not have yielded. For he was not deceived. 
1 Tim. 2:14. It requires men and women together to 
know and be true to God. 

'This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the 
only true God," — which each will know according as 
they know self — "and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast 



230 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

sent.*' Jno. 17 :3. When we know Christ as a life we 
do live we are true to self. 

Therefore, let the person who judges truth know that 
he may only rightly judge according as he knows him- 
self, and therefore knows God, and is true to self and 
thereby true to God. For the one who will not be true 
to himself as the image of God, how can he be true to 
God? And if not true to God why shall God reveal 
Himself to him? In speaking of self in this way, we 
are speaking of the creation in the image of God, which 
will renounce self for others just as God renounced 
Himself. 

It is a self which knows no self. Its spirit is self- 
renunciation. That is, the self which we must under- 
stand and to whom we must be true is the life of God 
within us, which, in perfection, is one of perfect love. 
No prejudices dare rule. No human restrictions or 
preconceived notions. It is God in us who loves and 
considers the welfare of others without regard to self, 
even as self -consistency or justice. For perfect love 
will be consistent with itself without trying. 

When we view human life in this manner is there a 
call in our souls that others shall be tortured in hell 
eternally ? When they have been in hell long enough to 
burn every vestige of self out of them is not the pun- 
ishment for a few years of living for self upon earth, 
sufficient? And do we imagine hell has not fire enough 
to burn out all of self in any person? 

Has God been so greatly offended at human beings 
who came into this world without their individual con- 
sent, and then lived a lifetime for self in rebellion to 
Him, that His love will desire that they shall be tor- 
tured eternally, even after the fire of hell has consumed 
all of self or self interest? Shall not His perfect love be 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 231 

satisfied, and justice be done, to at least permit them 
to return to a state of non-individuality or non-suffer- 
ing, after hell has consumed all opposition to Him ? Is 
it not more consistent with His love that salvation is 
a privilege for individual happiness through accepting 
Christ, rather than a necessity to be forced upon any, 
or f ollow^ed by wrath if they refuse ? 

Notwithstanding many scriptures which we have 
understood to teach the endurance of suffering forever 
of those who are cast into hell, when we perceive it 
is a God of perfect love who shall in the end be ''all in 
all," is it too hard for us to conceive that brief state- 
ment : "Death and hell were cast into the lake of fire" 
to mean that hell is thereby destroyed? Or that when 
death is cast into that lake suffering ceases? For the 
sting (or suffering) of death is sin. 1 Cor. 15:56. 

And if death is destroyed finally, in this "second 
death" the suffering of sin, or separation from God 
must be likewise destroyed. 

Therefore as we meditate upon these things let us 
be true to the perfect love of God in us, as we know 
Him within more perfectly. Because of the flesh we 
have not known ourself perfectly, and have failed in be- 
ing absolutely true to ourself, or to the God within us. 
At such times we have not known Him very well. 

And when you know yourself more perfectly than we 
know ourself, and are more true to yourself than we 
to ourself you shall surely know more of the light than 
is here given, and we shall seek to follow you. And 
we do pray God's speed to you in that advance into Him 
for whom, "As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, 
so panteth my soul after thee, God." Ps. 42 :1. 

Right in this connection we may each of us see our- 
selves as wonderful beings, when we behold in man a 



232 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

miniature of that which is going on in God*s wider cre- 
ation before He becomes ''all and in all." When we each 
pass from the innocency of childhood there comes a 
conflict in our life which has fear and torment, as a 
miniature world of our own. Until then we have God's 
nature, which shall see heaven. When we have re- 
nounced self in the first death to the old life after we 
know good and evil, the conflict rages with violence 
until self is overcome and God's sweet peace triumphs. 

When we reach that state that we are completely- 
dead to self — which may not be until we pass out of the 
body — it is the second death. We are consumed in 
love for Him. And then we become so one with Him 
that His individuality seems ours and ours His as ex- 
pressed in the words from heaven : **I will come in to 
him and sup with him, and he with Me." Rev. 3 :20. 

We shall then live, as it were, as a part of a great 
lake of love, each one, however, deliciously conscious 
of a distinct personal existence, which is an unspeak- 
able glory sufficient to make joyful all the suffering we 
shall endure, before we shall have reached that place 
in Him whom our soul loveth. 

And when we know that in the present through self- 
renunciation in love for others is the only way we may 
receive individual eternal life, and develop it within us, 
through faith in Christ, and when we further see that 
His redemption of all things was so complete that there 
is something of the eternal in everything with which 
we have to do, we may understand how literally true 
are all of His words in Jno. 6:48-58, clustering about 
the statement, ''Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of 
man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you." For 
there must be self-renunciation in our flesh as there 
was in His, for us to enter eternal life. And it must be 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 233 

in the life, represented in the blood, while this life is 
in the flesh, just as in Him. We dare not wait until the 
life is in hell, separate from the body, and then receive 
eternal life through self-renunciation. 

Therefore we may properly read, ''Except ye eat the 
flesh" — renounce self in the flesh — *'of the Son of man, 
and drink His blood" — or life of self-renunciation by 
renouncing our own life — **ye have no life" — eternal — 
"in you." Is it not so? 

Furthermore, there is no mystery nor room for con- 
tention as to whether the emblems of His body and 
blood are literally His flesh and blood for uS; when we 
see that in the fully developed Christ, and not the abor- 
tive Christ in the flesh, whom Paul beheld in the spirit, 
everything we may eat or drink which sustains the 
body, is but a part of the final perfect body that God 
has prepared in Him. It is therefore truly His flesh 
and blood for His children. Hence it is true of the em- 
blems sanctified in the Eucharist. 

They should be sanctified also as real health and sal- 
vation to our soul, spirit, and body, as we partake of 
them, if we would receive of Him as we may. More 
than that, let us receive into our bodies and lives a 
consciousness of eating and drinking His perfect health 
and strength in all of our food which is sanctified if we 
would receive Him still more. Let everything we see 
or hear or touch be sanctified and received after the 
same manner, and what a constant stream of His life 
and body shall flow into us from every side! It is all 
for us in this very way, and that we live in poverty of 
soul, weakness of body, or in straitened circumstances 
is simply because of human weakness which led God to 
exclaim in the long ago, through Isaiah : 

"Who so blind as he that is perfect?" or sanctified. 
"Or deaf as my messenger that I sent?" Isa. 42 :19. 



CHAPTER XII. 

"Perfect Love Casteth Out Fear." 

Perfect love is perfect God. Perfect God is perfect 
power, perfect peace, perfect health, and perfect hap- 
piness. It is not the volume of perfect love which casts 
out fear. When we have a little we have it all. For 
perfect love is not divisible any more than God is di- 
visible. Perfect love is not a substance that can be 
measured, nor is it a quality that can be compared. It 
is simply God Himself. 

God is in all of His children. Then perfect love is in 
them, too. If perfect love, why and how do they have 
fear? Fear to do the works of God? To heal the 
lame, the blind, and the deaf? To heal the consump- 
tives, cleanse the lepers, and raise the dead? Fear of 
pestilence, circumstances, or enemies? For have they 
not fear of some of these things? 

The reason is we do not permit perfect love to have 
His way in us. We do not permit Him to go out from 
us without restraint to bless others. We try to hide 
Him and coddle Him in our bosom of delight, and pro- 
tect Him, when He hides in shame under it all. For 
Perfect Love is a Creator, a Martyr, a Knight and a 
Gallant. He knows nothing but to give, give, give, to 
others. He cares not to receive, for He is perfect in 
Himself in giving. "Love seeketh not her own" be- 
cause her own comes to her without seeking. "Love 
believeth all things" because He gives Himself to all, 
therefore why shall they not prove true? "Love think- 
eth no evil" for He gives Himself to all things in con- 
suming all that would oppose Him. 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 235 

The fact is, we do not realize what we have within 
us when God is there. Nor what He is willing to do in 
us, and must do, if He has His way. For He would 
break the yoke of bondage, set the captives free, heal 
the broken-hearted if we but gave Him permission to 
do it. It would require no effort upon our part for all 
of this, but our consent only. Instead of this, we bind 
Him with self. 

Self doubts and suspicions and withholds and fears. 
Perfect Love would cast all of these out if self would 
let go. But He will not contend with even the shadow 
of self. He has renounced Self, therefore how can He 
contend ? 

Perfect Love "envieth not, vaunteth not itself, is 
not puffed up." It delights not in the Seen but in the 
Unseen within the Seen. It can not be "puffed up" or 
"vaunted," because it has renounced self, and it glories 
in no work or movement by men. It knows the great- 
est work and efforts of men are failures. That no 
man's work which is seen is a success. The only suc- 
cess which any one knows is Perfect Love overcoming 
self within him. Every step of that kind is success 
now and for eternity. But the success is not perfected 
so long as he has fear within him of anything, or to 
attempt anything. So long as Love is not perfected 
success is not perfected. "He that feareth is not made 
perfect in love." 1 Jno. 4:18. 

It is through withholding in some way that love is 
hindered from being made perfect. If nothing in our 
natures were held for self love would be made perfect 
within us, and we should not fear the power of devils 
to hinder immediate answers to prayer, or to withstand 
the work of our hands for a moment, or a command 
from our lips. When we think self is eliminated the 



236 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

fact of higher delight in anything but giving denotes 
that it is not so. It is the Seen appeaUng to us so uni- 
versally that hinders our dismissal of self. We unwit- 
tingly take delight in the Seen, and Perfect Love re- 
tires from our consciousness, leaving fear instead. 

Hearing the praises of men and v^omen is a snare in 
the Seen, because it places before us the recipients of 
our blessings, robbing us for a moment, if possible, of 
the pure delight of giving without ceasing, in touch 
with the blessed Unseen. Therefore Christ said : *'Woe 
unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! For 
so did their fathers to the false prophets.'* This is not 
that Christians are necessarily false of whom all speak 
well. Christ Himself grew to manhood "in favour 
with God and Man." Luke 2:52, The church, in her 
days of greatest glory and power had '^favour with all 
the people." It was required of a bishop that he "must 
have a good report of them which are without.'* 1 
Tim. 3 :7. 

The "woe" was the hindrance of Love being "made 
perfect," in the temptation of self in them to delight in 
receiving, rather than in the giving of Perfect Love. It 
is indeed so great a woe to the perfection of Love that 
it is probably impossible for any person to reach that 
state amidst the good will of all persons. On the con- 
trary, their persecutions will help to crucify self so 
that it may be reached. Therefore, it is that Christ 
further said : 

"Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when 
they shall separate you from their company, and shall 
reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the 
Son of man's sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for 
joy ; for behold, your reward is great in heaven : for in 
the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets. 
Luke 6 :23. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 237 

The rejoicing should not be for the reason that oppo- 
sition is raised by their zeal, as many in mistaken zeal 
imagine, but because such are the very conditions 
which will hasten love being made perfect within them 
to do the mighty works of a prophet. It is what fitted 
the prophets before them to minister in the mighty 
things of God. It took their eyes from the Seen be- 
cause the opposition in the Seen became sorrow to them 
and not pleasure. It forced them to place their entire 
delight in giving. None received of them to detract 
from the Unseen by pleasure in the Seen. 

It is God^s way of making prophets and men mighty 
in word and deed. Men of greater power and wisdom 
and foresight than bishops who lead the flocks of the 
Lord in the Seen. Therefore, their need of evil reports 
about them, while the bishop should be a man of good 
report. The man who courts God's highest blessing 
and power while in the flesh, to the perfection of his 
discipleship, may therefore expect to be led into paths 
where others misunderstand them, and separate them 
from their company, as being evil. They may leap for 
joy when shunned by their fellow disciples, not for 
error, but for the deeper truths they are led into. For 
that is the certain and necessary road to the highest 
discipleship. They will be understood later, just as 
Christ was, afterwards, but this shall not be their joy. 
Their joy shall be in the perfection of God's love, form- 
ing within them in lives of joyful, rushing giving. A 
full baptism with the Holy Ghost, as on the day of 
Pentecost, will usher them into that joy, but cruci- 
fixions of the flesh, either before or after the baptism, 
will be necessary for them to live lives of God's free 
power. 

Right here, again, with men and women it is differ- 



238 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

ent. A woman is at her best, spiritually, when she has 
due appreciation of her work from man. A man is at 
his best, spiritually, when he is rejected by every one 
and is forced to look to God alone for recognition. 

God has tried, during the centuries, to lead men to 
this place of isolation with Him through permitting 
persecutions to come to turn them from the Seen in 
every way. Only here and there has been a man with 
a face set with humility and wisdom towards Him so 
that He could use him as a prophet or worker of mira- 
cles. A man who could endure the schooling by being 
"made perfect in love." So few have understood what 
God was trying to prepare them for, hence turned 
aside in failure, becoming churlish prophets of calam- 
ity instead of prophets of triumphant Love. 

The church has almost universally considered the 
office of bishop as being the nearest to God's heart, and 
the highest to be reached here below. And when per- 
secutions came upon a bishop, so that evil reports and 
misunderstanding spread, notwithstanding his heart 
was fixed upon God, the man lost his influence if not 
his office in the church. Not understanding, he drooped 
under the sting of incompetency, and he passed out of 
memory as a fading light. Had he only understood 
that God was trying to prepare him in the only school 
which could do it, for a closer walk with Him than a 
bishop can possibly have when active in his work of 
shepherding souls in the Seen, he could have borne it 
all in triumph. Moreover, the time is now at hand for 
this distinction to be impressed upon men as never 
before. 

Never was there a time when men are being called 
into a walk with God, isolated from their fellows, such 
as now. Many call it a time of "testing." So it is. Not 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 239 

a testing as to whether they are true believers, so much 
as a testing of those who can walk so close to His heart 
as to accomplish the great things which are before us, 
revealed in the unfolding of the scriptures. How many, 
many men of previous high office in the church, have 
gone down under persecution, who, had they stood the 
testing, might now be fitted to bring to pass th^ things 
which God has for us, and is now placing before His 
church ! Things too much in the Unseen to be done by 
bishops, to be reached through disgrace and suffer- 
ing after the manner of Christ, who reached perfection 
through suffering. Men in high church office in a vis- 
ible ministry can not be made perfect in love while 
they retain the approval of all. Their very ministry is 
a gift coming under the laws we now notice of giving. 

That is, love is hindered from being made perfect in 
us by the presence of the beneficiaries of our gifts, with 
this relation recognized. For the Seen expressing 
pleasure in receiving, is riveted upon us. Hence the 
wisdom of Christ's instruction: "When thou doest 
thine alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right 
hand doeth : that thine alms may be in secret : and thy 
Father which seeth in secret Himself shall reward thee 
openly." Matt. 6 :3,4. 

This would not only prevent the Seen diverting our 
eyes and heart to it, but to "let not thy left hand know" 
signifies an absence of what some call "intelligent giv- 
ing" or giving to the "worthy poor." Instead, there 
is the very joy of giving "to him that asketh of thee" 
(Matt. 5 :42) , without further thought than that it is 
God's will. For when love is made perfect within us 
we are conscious of as close a relation to our heavenly 
Father as Christ had that "No man can come to 
me, except the Father which hath sent me draw 



240 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

him." The same Father's Spirit which will bring 
others to ask of us will surely enable us to give what 
they seek, because it is His will. 

It is sometimes next to impossible, if not quite so, for 
us to have perfect love and walk much amidst those 
to whom we give, or to remember our blessings given 
to them. A happiness from their joy in receiving is 
certain to bring self before us, which robs us of the 
perfect joy of giving only, and thereby maintaining 
only perfect Love in our hearts. Instead, love will be 
made perfect in us much more quickly if we give 
blindly, as it were, turning as if lost from those who 
receive, happy in the faith that the "bread cast upon 
the waters" shall return to us after many days. With- 
out looking for it we shall know in faith that our word 
shall not return unto us void, because it is given in the 
Spirit of the Lord, who said this of the Word He gave. 

Because we do not more freely give in this way, gifts 
of the Spirit, of knowledge, prophecy, understanding, 
wealth and health, are not bestowed more freely than 
they are upon us. God delights to pour His abundance 
of all the gifts He has upon the world, and will surely 
do so the moment He can find a channel of ministry 
through men, after His own heart of delight solely in 
giving, giving, giving. And men whom God calls to 
walk with Him, under persecution of their brethren 
usually turn from His pure delight and seek their 
favor, not seeing the law of His Perfect Love to be 
worked out through these very persecutions. But let 
every man keep his face set like a flint toward God, 
and grow in perfect love until he can ''bear all things," 
and the Father will surely reveal His hand to the world 
through his ministry. 

While we are being ''made perfect in love" we are 



TBE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 241 

hindered not only by things upon the outside to entice 
us to delight in their response to our giving, but within 
ourselves is even a greater hindrance after the same 
manner. The body we see in which we live> the mind 
we know, and the feelings we experience, all belong to 
the Seen, in the natural, and our tendency is to delight 
in their response to our life in God, which response we 
see. 

For instance, when our hands are laid upon the sick 
and they are healed, we delight in the ministry. We 
see that which buoys us up in lightness of heart, mak- 
ing us see the service as being worth while. When our 
mind responds in the power of teaching others of the 
Spirit, how we delight in thought ! When our feelings 
of God's glory is imparted to others we are happy in 
giving testimony. And when, upon the other hand, 
all of these fail to reach others for God we are cast 
down and discouraged. It is because our eyes are upon 
the Seen, loving a response from it in all of these. 

When we are made perfect in love we shall do and 
give because God is in us in complete renunciation of 
self. And God takes no account of the arm of the 
flesh, or the mind of man, or the feeling of self's heart. 
But the impossible is given forth in command through 
them all with confidence such as said in the beginning : 

"Let there be light : and there was light." "Let the 
dry land appear : and it was so." 

God's delight was perfect in the giving of Himself 
that it might be so, as we noticed in chapter two. His 
gladness was so perfect that He did not look for their 
appearance and hail it with greater joy. His happi- 
ness was full in the giving, regardless of what followed. 
In the absence of all fear as to the result, the appear- 
ance could not fail to follow the command. Everything 



242 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

which He made was in the same perfect love which had 
no more perfect joy in seeing it done. It was the giv- 
ing of His own precious Presence which was His hap- 
piness, and not the appearance which followed. 

Therefore our supreme delight shall be in our spirit 
of giving, giving, giving of self for others, which is per- 
fect love and perfect God. The things which appear in 
response to our giving is mostly dross, anyway, and 
not the real presence of God. God's Spirit of giving is 
eternal, as He will aways be giving. The response we 
see is temporal. 

The body we see and the mind we know and the 
heart with which we feel are but the shell enclosing 
the Unseen. The person who leaps in health at the 
touch of our hands is but the body put into motion by 
the spiritual body filling it from heaven, and moving 
it to give as heaven gives, instead of the tiny spark of 
eternal life which had been there. This is what the 
baptism in the Holy Ghost does for one. The "new 
tongues" with which it speaks is but the filling of the 
natural body with that spiritual body which is theirs 
through God's finished work in Christ, and God using 
the old tongue in giving expression to His love. And 
so it is with all things which God fills. They are moved 
to give as He gives. Perfect love within us has its joy 
in coming into "touch" with God for them before the 
Seen appears. Therefore, why shall it be prevented 
from being made perfect in us by our turning to the 
Seen for a part of our delight? 

Perfect love is in the Unseen, and as we noticed in 
chapter four, the Seen and the tjnseen do not mix and 
retain God's greatest power. When the two kinds of 
love mix within us we may have joy and praise, but 
there is fear also, which only perfect love by itself can 
cast out. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 243 

The root of all partiality, respect of persons, evil 
judgments, etc., lies in a desire to receive. We treat 
the one most pleasing to us better than the one most 
displeasing because we love to receive that which 
pleases and not that which displeases. Perfect love 
goes out to both alike. But it is enlarged by contact 
with the naturally displeasing, both because of the 
overcoming of the natural which is necessary, and be- 
cause the displeasing has naturally every man's hand 
against it and is therefore hungry to receive love. 

What a field there is for our love to enlarge by going 
out to earth's masses upon masses of eager, hungry, 
starving souls, who are in disfavor because unfortu- 
nate. Such are the ones who are empty of the world's 
love and who receive the love we might give them with 
eyes brimming over in tears. But we can satisfy them 
with Heaven's love only by giving with no thought of 
the responsive tears in preference to stony glares. 
When the tears, and not the giving alone, make us 
glad we lose both power and happiness which is of 
heaven. 

We can readily see how we can not give others per- 
fect love while we are in a position of visible authority 
over them, and then take notice whether they heed our 
commands. For self takes pleasure in one who obeys 
more than in one who disobeys. Our happiness is 
then marred and our power shortened. We can not 
have God's happiness and power in commanding 
others, or even in expressing our wish or will, if we 
take personal account of whether they heed us. There- 
fore the necessity of foregoing authority of any kind 
over persons if we would have perfect love which casts 
out fear. 

Perfect love is not hard to receive. It does not take 



244 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY : 

great cruciiixion for it to enter. But we must know 
how to receive it, and we must know it when we do 
receive it. We must receive it from God through faith 
in Christ, first, and we thereafter keep on receiving 
more largely only as we send it out in obedience to 
Christ's spirit. 

As long as we receive in this way we fear neither 
men, devils, nor circumstances they can bring about. 
But they fear us as the lions feared Daniel and the 
fire feared his three friends. As the Red Sea feared 
Moses and Jericho feared Joshua and death feared 
Elijah and the tomb feared Christ. Therefore we re* 
peat, it is when the thought or desire of receiving love 
or favor of response or blessings or even freedom 
enters, that fear enters. The more closely we analyze 
the facts the more clearly we see this is true. Self is 
there the moment such a thought enters. It can not 
enter except in favor of self. And as we noticed in 
chapter two it is in favor of self that Satan has his 
seat within our mind. 

For example : We fear to speak of a certain matter. 
It is because we prefer our speech shall be received 
favorably, that we fear. We fear a weakness or pain 
in our body, hence shrink from it. It is because we 
think of strength or freedom we would like to have. 
We fear the indigestion of our food. It is when we 
think of the pleasure or strength we should like to 
have in eating. We fear we shall lack in clothes, food, 
shelter, prosperity, etc. It is when we think of what 
we should like to have in that way. 

But what shall we do about it when actual conditions 
exist which give us reason to fear? Let perfect love 
go out to them. The harder and more unreasonable 
they are the larger our love may be because the more 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 245 

they can receive of it. The greater the opportunity of 
growing our heavenly character by overcoming. 

Seeing difficulties is desiring something different. 
And this desire destroys perfect love because it is of 
self. Taking the greatest delight in meeting things 
just as they come before us and overcoming, is perfect 
love. For that is why God placed them there — that we 
might overcome. The love which goes out to persons 
and things and to our own natural weaknesses, im- 
partially, is what changes conditions that the things 
that are not become the things that are, and the things 
that are become the things that are not. Earth is lifted 
into heaven and heaven is made to swallow earth. 

This is not fancy. It is not hallucination. It is not 
soaring. It is very practical and very tangible. Rea- 
son is against it if we leave God out of consideration. 
It is unreservedly in its favor when we receive God and 
permit the simplest of His spiritual laws of our salva- 
tion to run their course clear in us. It is self in the 
way which opposes it and which makes acceptance diffi- 
cult. Self must be consumed and God will manifest 
Himself as we say, whether we understand it or not. 

The rule of love in finally reaching established per- 
fection in human lives is for them to begin with per- 
fect love, then pass into fear, from which they emerge 
again to where fear is cast out by perfect love. The 
child, for instance, until it has been taught to withhold 
or to fear, gives upon every hand, to friends or stran- 
gers. It fears nothing and may enter where older ones 
dare only at the peril of their life. When the child 
learns to withhold and to look for exchange of favors, 
it learns to fear. 

All bargains agreed upon before the exchange of 
goods or favors, is from fear lest advantage should be 



246 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

taken by the other. There is absence of perfect love. 
Only under a baptism of God's spirit of self-renuncia- 
tion is one made perfect in love, so that they give, give, 
give, like a little child, which indeed they have become 
again, in their relation to the heavenly Father. Prior 
to the baptism they may have eternal life, and be happy 
in giving to those who respond, but it is not the love 
life which follows it. God is pleased with the former, 
but He is so delighted with the latter that He comes in 
to sup where perfect love abides. 

The reason one fears when anticipating response 
from giving is that the response is from the self of 
the other to his ow^n self, and Satan has his seat in 
self. Because Satan is a deceiver, strong enough to 
rule self, there is a reason to fear the outcome. Upon 
the other hand, the reason there is no fear in perfect 
love in giving without withholding for any cause, is be- 
cause self is renounced so completely we are one with 
all of God, and He is so true in renouncing Himself 
wholly for us that we know He can not and will not 
fail. Then there is such a forgetfulness of self in lov- 
ing and giving that what can we fear that will injure 
or disparage us? 

If it be true that perfect happiness and absence of 
fear is dependent upon giving, free of self, and not at 
all dependent upon receiving, do we wonder why God 
says that it has not "entered into the heart of man the 
things which God hath prepared for them that love 
Him?" Why does He give if it is not necessary for us 
to receive in order to be happy or free? 

"Those that love Him" is not synonymous with 
"those that receive of Him in thankfulness." To love 
Him as He loves, which is the only love that makes us 
one with Him, requires indeed that we receive of Him, 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 247 

but not for self. When we do so we can not love Him 
as He loves us, for He receives not for Self. But we 
give, give, give, continually. Such are the ones for 
whom He has prepared things that the heart never has 
and never can conceive. For the heart naturally is for 
self, and self can not realize it. Such love comes from 
God only and God's own Holy Spirit must reveal its 
riches. Hence the word continues, "But God hath re- 
vealed them unto us by His Spirit." 

And how is it? It is simple enough. First, the min- 
istry to others which God hath prepared for those who 
love as He loves is great beyond the thought of man. 
For no man can live as a lump of lifeless clay, even in 
the natural. Self's thought is to receive. So the man 
is more receptive on every side than a sponge is in 
water. He receive, receives, and receives. Self thinks 
of nothing but to receive. Or if it gives it is to receive 
of equal value in exchange, if it can not receive greater. 

So man receives in eating. In sleeping. In breath- 
ing. In absorbing energy, life, inspiration, sounds, 
fragrance, beauty, etc., etc. The more he is a live hu- 
man being the more he is receptive in thousands of 
ways. He can not help it, and live. Such a center of 
absorption is he that one wonders what becomes of it 
all. The answer is given in a sentence: 

It is all consumed in self. 

Is it not so? Let the truth sink and permeate until 
we see what a great being self is, that it can consume 
this continual inflow from everything about us. How 
great self is to receive abundantly through the years 
and still live, unfolds to us a little of the mystery of 
one's own being. We should say it is impossible that 
self can consume so great an inflow in every way, as a 
thirsty sponge that is never filled. And yet it is so. 



248 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

Self is never satisfied. And we should marvel at the 
power there might be, could all that is received be di- 
verted into something besides, and outside of, self. 

This is just what conversion to God contemplates. 
It is to turn square about from receiving into self and 
to give out in love as God loves. Perfect conversion is 
to turn all of this receiving and consuming in self into 
a stream of blessing others whose power is inconceiv- 
able. It is to turn this river of the Water of Life from 
pouring into a bottomless abyss in the midst of a des- 
ert, into blessings which appear in blossom and fruit 
of gold and gladness and sunshine of heaven upon 
earth. 

When self is so completely overcome that there is no 
resistance of God's love to others we shall be continual 
channels of heaven's blessings to them without travail 
of soul. The health we are receiving constantly will 
discharge into them, in the gift of healing. The knowl- 
edge into our minds, in the gift of knowledge. The 
prosperity of hills covered with cattle and mountains 
filled with gold, will flow to them in the gift of giving. 
Rom. 12 :6-8. For if we give unto men heaven's richest 
spiritual things they will surely minister to us abund- 
antly of their carnal things. It is because we have so 
little to give to others that the ministers in spiritual 
things live or work like mendicants, for the poor and 
needy. 

It is the consuming of self in God's love which shall 
admit us into His perfect heaven. We taste of heaven 
when we may live in that state while ministering upon 
earth. It is difficult for us to have such freedom here 
because our ministry is so much in the Seen. Lacking 
freedom, we therefore, lack power. And at times when 
we have love which eliminates self completely and we 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 249 

begin to manifest the power of God, because it is in the 
Seen and through us who are seen, a horde of persons 
who behold fix their eyes upon us with such mental 
force that, through the natural power of suggestion, 
we can scarce withstand it, but are forced to regard 
self. Fear follows and God's power through us is 
diminished. So it is that wonderful and miraculous 
demonstrations of God's presence through men and 
women appear and recede and appear again in waves, 
as it were. We might hope to succeed more perfectly 
in freedom from self, were it not that others see and 
bring us back to the self we were leaving when God 
manifests Himself greatly through us. 

Herein has God arranged simply and grandly for our 
ministry in the Seen, by a present help from the Un- 
seen. It is in sending His children forth "two and 
two" in their ministry. Christ did so when He was 
upon earth. Luke 10:1. He promised them "That if 
two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything 
they shall ask it shall be done for them of my Father 
which is in heaven." "Where two or three are gath- 
ered together in my name, there am I in the midst of 
them." Matt. 18:19,20. Let the sick call "for the 
elders (not elder) of the church." 

And while all of this may be observed in simple faith 
because it is commanded, and God therefore blesses, 
there is doubtless the Unseen and the Seen represented 
in the ministry of the two in such a way as to permit 
God's perfect love to manifest Himself in freedom of 
self in those who minister. A way in which the natu- 
ral power of mental suggestion unconsciously exercised 
by those who see, over those who minister, compelling 
them to regard self, whether they will or no, may be 
cast down. 



250 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

For, as truly as unbelief in those who look upon 
God's minister may prevent His mighty power mani- 
festing itself (see Matt. 13 :58 ; Mark 5 :40) , so the cen- 
tering of eyes upon God's ministering servant will 
surely prevent the freedom from self which he desires 
and must have in order to be God's free channel in 
blessing others. 

In order to understand this we must know that in 
all material accomplishments there are two which 
work, and these two al*e one — ^the Seen and the Unseen. 
It is the Unseen pouring itself into the Seen which re- 
sults in all we see. It was so in the beginning. The 
unseen Father poured Himself into the Son, whom men 
saw, and thereby "He made the worlds." Heb. 1 :2. 

In one's self it is the unseen mind pouring itself into 
the seen hand to accomplish with skill the machine we 
use or the cakes we eat or the piano music we hear. It 
is the unseen properties of earth and air pouring them- 
selves into the color of the rose we see. It is the unseen 
life pouring itself into the seen flower which makes 
possible its reproduction through the seed which is 
formed. It is so in all reproduction of life. And in 
order for it to be so, the Seen and the Unseen are one, 
always. Together with the Spirit uniting them they 
are a Trinity. 

Is it not such oneness for which Christ prayed — 
"that they may be one, even as we are one?" Jno. 
17:22. And which is the agreement of "two" which 
shall receive anything asked for? Is not this the de- 
sign of two or more uniting in prayer, in which the 
Unseen pours itself into the Seen, and through it to 
reach the end desired? 

For indeed, if it is God's order that in prophesying 
or teaching one shall speak at a time while the others 
hold their peace (1 Cor. 14:26-31), shall we approach 



TEE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 251 

Him in prayer less reverently or in less order than we 
speak to men? And when one thus ministers before 
men in the Seen, shall not those who are silent pour 
life received from the Unseen into him and through 
him, that his prayers be answered, his touch heal, and 
evil spirits flee at his command? 

Is not this a relation that should be between God's 
children, that they may be one as Christ in the Seen 
and the Father in the Unseen were one? Is not this the 
way in which self may be out of all who thus unite in 
a ministry, that God may flow through without re- 
striction ? 

For they in the quiet pour love unselfishly to all man- 
kind, centering its flow through the channel of the one 
who ministers. Forgetting themselves he or she be- 
comes their self. Not as they please in the natural, 
for as such they are renounced. But as channels of 
ministry the one in the Seen becomes their self, while 
self in themselves is lost sight of in perfect love which 
takes no thought of credit. 

Truly it is difficult for those who see to give them 
credit, because they can not behold what they are doing 
in the Unseen. There is an advantage to be had in such 
silence, to be free of self before the Lord, as can not be 
estimated, over a ministry which can be seen. 

And the one who ministers in the Seen, when he is 
conscious of a companion by his side, or a group around 
him, with such a power which is free of self, and 
stronger than that of all who would bring his self to 
mind in his ministry, by reason of being in touch with 
God, has a mighty bulwark of heaven which he con- 
sciously may lean upon. He hkewise may lose sight of 
self in his eager dependence upon them receiving from 
the Unseen and pouring heaven's power and life 
through him to those to whom he ministers. 



252 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

It is thus and thus only that "two and two" or more 
may have greater freedom from self, and consequently 
more of perfect love and happiness to overcome all the 
deception of the adversary, in their ministry, than one 
can have alone in the most devout life which it is pos- 
sible to live. 

More than that, the ones who are quiet are free for 
the moment, to gather the Unseen of all of earth^s 
needy ones into their heart, as it were, and by faith see 
God'S freedom for them as He sees. This volume of 
freedom for all is brought to a focus within them to 
be touched by the one who ministers in the Seen, and 
poured singly into them he ministers to according to 
his oneness with those in the quiet, and the receptive- 
ness of the others. He is thus the channel of a great- 
ness of power from the Unseen more than any one per- 
son can contain, and as it sweeps through the subjects 
of his ministry why should not they be visited with 
God's own freedom. 

Perfect love thus in the Unseen is a life of accept- 
ance in perfection of everything asked for in the Spirit, 
instead of a life of supplication. It is a life of Christ 
in the Father where, in unison with Christ in the Un- 
seen, one need not pray the Father for those who ap- 
proach Him in the Spirit, because "the Father Himself 
loveth" such. Jno. 16 :26, 27. A life of such love occu- 
pies a place of greater power before the Father than 
a life of supplication occupies. For acceptance is more 
positive and powerful than requesting. 

It was because Christ went to the Father that He 
could do and promise us greater works that He had 
done in the Seen. Jno. 14 :12. For He then lived a life 
of acceptance through His own atonement. While upon 
earth, prior to His resurrection, His life was one of 



THE INFINITE^N TRINITY AND UNITY 253 

prayer because He had not yet perfected His life of 
acceptance. He still dwelt in the Seen. 

It is so with His children. He who lives and minis- 
ters in the Seen must pray. He who would live and 
have the greatest power of the Unseen must accept. 
To do this perfectly requires crucifixion and consuming 
of self. If those who pray are wholly responsive to 
those who accept, the strength in the Spirit of the lat- 
ter will be immediately received to give them the bold- 
ness of commanding faith and power. 

Better the support of one person who accepts in the 
Spirit the petition asked for than one hundred persons 
who are one with him in prayer but who do not accept 
it as done. For perfect love is perfect God, and when 
God accepts, whether He be in man without hindrance, 
or in heaven, it is done. 

But let not those who would have commanding faith 
assume to teach new things. For they will come under 
criticism and condemnation. Let their messages be so 
winning that those who hear will obey anything they 
say in gladness. Then they will respond to the com- 
mand of faith in God's will. 

When Peter took the hand of the cripple and com- 
manded him to walk, so that he quickly obeyed, John, 
in the quiet was perhaps more largely in touch with 
the Unseen than was Peter, the spokeman. But from 
their oneness of spirit the Unseen passed into the crip- 
ple with God's health from heaven. 

All of this is but God united with men as He wishes 
to be. We have a fault of reaching out for God when 
He Himself assures us He is within us. ''He that abid- 
eth in me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much 
fruit; for without Me ye can do nothing." Jno. 15:5. 
"The kingdom of God is within you." When God is 



254 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

abiding in us health is abiding there. We have His 
wisdom, knowledge, understanding, wealth, power, and 
perfect love. 

In His perfect love, however, we are not thinking 
of this. We are not claiming it. We are not talking 
about it. We are not affirming it. We are not even 
accepting it as something from the outside. We are 
simply consciously abiding in it. Perfect Love and 
Perfect Love in us. But we are thinking, talking, af- 
firming, and accepting it in others, with all its bless- 
ings. For Perfect Love within us loses itself for others 
as God gave Himself for us. To center love in us cen- 
ters it in self, therefore, it is not perfect. To center 
love and all of its blessings in others is to love in aban- 
donment of self. Then it manifests itself in us also. 

Then we say of others, friends and enemies alike, 
without respect of persons: "They have health, they 
have salvation, they have riches, they have wisdom, 
knowledge, peace," and so on. Accepting it for them is 
more powerful than praying that they have it, just as 
accepting God within us is more effective than praying 
for Him to come in. For God in His own perfect love 
is accepting all blessings for us in the flesh through the 
atonement. And just as those we are accepting in per- 
fect love reach an attitude where they can receive it 
Heaven's own blessings will come into their lives. We 
are thus "workers together with God" in His own per- 
fect will and His highest ways of blessing His creation. 

Except God abides in us after this manner the weak- 
ness of self is within us and consequent fear. Fear to 
control and command devils because devils are stronger 
than self. Therefore, we can not do the mighty works 
of God, just as a man who fears a vicious horse can 
not control him with power belonging to man. But 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 255 

when he rises to his manhood above the animal, fear 
goes out and the control is very easy. 

The strength of God in a person is not signified by a 
passive or indifferent belief in all things, and a conse- 
quent acceptance without discernment. But it is rather 
measured by our ability to perceive discrepancies, 
faults, imperfections, etc., in high ideals, and then, by 
positive faith in the Unseen Eternal in them all, to rise 
above the Seen, of whatever character, and see the Per- 
fect in Christ, as representing God's renunciation of 
Himself. Such strength will cause God's presence to 
pervade an assembly in softening each towards the 
other, and in filling them with freedom and love ac- 
cording to their responsiveness to God's Spirit in 
Himself. 

It brings God's mercy close to earth. For God will 
not smite men and women for wrongs when others 
have the strength of His love, in their midst, to rise 
above the wrongs seen in beholding His perfection in 
them in the Unseen. He does not then deal with them 
as in other ages when love was not there. But the 
more His love is shown through men and women upon 
earth the more the world shall be preserved, notwith- 
standing its wickedness. And the more it is preserved 
by such love the more certainly shall souls be kept from 
perishing. For it is the same love which makes God 
"not willing that any should perish," and which holds 
the heavens and earth intact even now. See 2 Pet. 
3 :7-9. 

The power of unreserved acceptance is the final tri- 
umph of perfect love. Let one person pray in the Seen 
with wisdom and the other accept the request answered 
in perfect love and nothing is impossible. For that is 
God's love. "It shall come to pass, that before they call, 



256 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY i 

I will answer ; and while they are yet speaking I will 
hear." Isa. 65:24. 

We have holy laughter when God answers prayer, 
in healing, saving, or prospering. Perfect love in the 
Unseen will laugh at the beginning of the prayer. God 
saw the things He created, which are described in the 
first of Genesis, as '*good," before a single creation 
had appeared in the Seen. 

How shall we receive the perfect love which accepts 
so freely? Which laughs in confidence that "things 
present, or things to come; all are yours; and ye are 
Christ's; and Christ is God's." We shall receive by 
giving, giving, giving, and withholding absolutely noth- 
ing for self. For that is the love of God towards us. 

"Give to him that asketh of thee" is a command 
whose richness we have not begun to fathom. Give 
wisdom, knowledge, time, labor, money, food, clothes, 
confidence, feelings, belief, assurance, judgment, etc., 
etc., etc. When we are one with God He will not permit 
a thing to be asked of us which we can not give. There 
are mountains filled with gold which He will reveal to 
the person who holds not a thing for self, in any way. 
We fail to know where they are because we hold some- 
thing for self. 

God Himself could not find His own gold if He with- 
held a thing of all which He has created, or of Him- 
self, for Himself. It is His wisdom and riches and 
freedom and health which is disclosed to the one who 
rises above prayer, and accepts without reserve, as be- 
ing grantedj the prayer of the one in the Seen. His 
love is not perfect until he does this. He retains the 
reserve and judgment of self instead. The "two agree" 
by the one yielding himself wholly to the other^ in the 
Unseen. 



THE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 257 

The love of God in man and woman uniting in going 
out to others has a power neither may have as chan- 
nels independent of the other. The two form perfect 
man, spiritually as well as physically. His perfection 
of happiness does not depend upon the consciousness of 
her responding to his love, but both happiness and 
power are enlarged in God's love through her uniting 
with his in going out to others. She is his **help meet" 
in this. 

Indeed, does she not consume his tendency to dwell 
upon the Seen? That is, her very dependence upon 
consciously being loved, for her perfect happiness, is 
representative to him of the Seen everywhere calling 
for the love of God. **For we know that the whole 
creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until 
now" (Rom. 8:22), for God's love. And as her love 
unites with him in perfect love to all there is the fore- 
taste of the enlarged life when all of the Seen shall 
be purged, and shall unite in God's holy love to others. 
And the consciousness of union with his strength in 
love, as she ministers in obedience to him, is the inspi- 
ration she needs to perfect her happiness and power in 
God's perfect love to others. 

Receiving from any person that which is given 
grudgingly and not cheerfully as a privilege to give, 
hinders perfect love which gives as God gives. It 
therefore hinders His giving so freely to us. It is the 
Father's life which is in God when none can reach 
God's heart in giving grudgingly in anything. It is 
the Unseen which regards the spirit of the giving and 
refuses to receive except of a like spirit. When one 
receives only in this spirit everything needed comes 
to him to give to others. 

In the Seen where one exercises authority they may 



258 , TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

receive things given less freely. For the necessity of 
them disciplining others will force them to receive re- 
gard and obedience as well as other things grudgingly 
from those disciplined. They can not then give per- 
fect love to all as God gives except they are in respon- 
sive relation to the one whose ministry is in the Un- 
seen, and who refuses to receive that which is not 
given as a privilege, free of grudge or necessity. It 
is the union between disciples which was between 
Christ and the Father when Christ had authority here, 
and received attention from those who heard Him 
grudgingly. 

What babes all of us still are in the walk God has 
for us ! What holdings the flesh has upon us where we 
thought we were wholly in the Spirit. For instance, 
our most "spiritual" praise meetings are filled with 
testimonies of what we have received in the Seen in 
direct answer to prayer. Or we praise the messengers 
through which we have received wonderful healings, 
salvations, prosperity, or freedom from evil spirits. It 
is all well pleasing to God, as from babes in spiritual 
life who have not grown into perfected praise. Into 
lives which are a part of Heaven's loving and blessing, 
rather than in receiving. 

Desiring the prayers of others signifies that we are 
not yet grown up in the manhood of Christ. It is not 
displeasing to God. Paul frequently desired the pray- 
ers of the saints. But in perfect love one has no need. 
It was perfect love Christ knew His disciples should 
enter into when He anticipated : "At that day ye shall 
ask in my name: and I say not unto you, that I will 
pray the Father for you: for the Father Himself 
loveth you." Jno. 16 :26, 27. 

Is not that same place for us as for them, in Christ 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 259 

with the Father? And when we are so fully accepted 
that Christ need not pray for us, why shall we desire 
our brethren to pray ? We reach it only when we have 
entered the life of praise which is acceptance of God's 
perfection and wisdom in everything. It is a life of 
prayer in flowing communion with God, and not the 
prayer of supplication. It is a life in which we hold 
every one perfect before God in all their trials, instead 
of asking Him to reach down and help them. It is a 
life we enter through giving, forgetful of all receiving 
or need of receiving. 

In that life, however, even as teachers we shall take 
no thought of credit due us as channels of God's bless- 
ings to others. Few are able to teach in this spirit, 
therefore few receive the gift, and still fewer perfect 
it. The uttered word always invites either acceptance 
or rejection, and self desires to have it accepted. Self's 
ears itch for approval. But more powerful than much 
teaching in a mixed assembly is silently blessing others 
with God's unseen power. 

Who of us have learned of God the power of silent 
ministry in His perfect love which casts out fear? Is 
it not true that through all the ages, during which God 
has in some way spoken continually to mankind, this 
speaking in a perfect oral ministry through human 
voice occupied only about three years when Christ was 
upon earth, besides now and then speaking through His 
prophets? Many men have spoken as moved by His 
Spirit, it is true, but not always as His perfect oracles. 

And yet God has led men constantly to Him without 
their fearing, by His silent, perfect love. So the teacher, 
in the perfect use of his gift, will love much and speak 
little, except to those who come to him, with power in 
the Unseen. All who would have their respective gifts 



260 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

of the Spirit perfected will minister after the same 
manner. When this becomes the rule the Holy Spirit 
will bring the needy from the ends of the earth to them. 
And when the people of the Lord are gathered in one 
place, seeing eye to eye with each other in their several 
ministries there shall be fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah 
2:2,3: 

**And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the 
mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in 
the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the 
hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many 
people shall go and say, ''Come ye, and let us go up to 
the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of 
Jacob; and He will teach us of His ways, and we will 
walk in His paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the 
law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem." 

And ''His paths" are the paths of Perfect Love. 



CHAPTER XIII. 
'The Perfect Law of Liberty." 

In perfecting His love in men God has led the race 
along the line which the individual experiences in 
reaching the state where love is made perfect in him. 
That is, the Bible account of the first pair shows them 
in a state of perfect love wherein was no fear. So long 
as Adam's love went out towards God in the Garden of 
Eden, "to dress and keep it, without desire for self, 
amidst all that was "pleasant to the sight and good for 
food," he lived in a state of happiness. While this con- 
tinued he had no fear. The moment he anticipated 
joy and profit in receiving fruit "good for food," 
"pleasant to the eyes," and "to be desired to make one 
wise," all of which was offered by Eve for his self, he 
became afraid of God. Gen. 2 :9,15 ; 3 :6-8. 

God immediately put him under a new law. Not 
one of giving any longer with no thought of receiving. 
But a law of exchange wherein he could give and should 
receive. He should toil and sweat in tilling the ground, 
but in exchange should "eat the herb of the field." Man 
should bruise the serpent's head, but in return it should 
bruise his heel. 

When God gave Israel a law it was the law of ex- 
change, and not the law of perfect love. An eye for an 
eye, a tooth for a tooth. Blessing for blessing. Offer- 
ing for sin. Health for obedience. "Blessed is he that 
considereth the poor : the Lord will deliver him in time 
of trouble." Ps. 41:1. 

He gave them the law of tithing, whereby He prom- 



262 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

ised them to prove if, in exchange for the tenth, "I will 
not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out 
a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to re- 
ceive it/' Mai. 3:10. 

But the law of tithing is not the law of perfect love. 
The law from Sinai, with ceremonies and ordinances, 
was a law of exchange. They were commanded indeed 
to *'love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and 
with all thy soul, and with all thy might," but, as no- 
ticed in the first chapter, they could not do it. It was 
an ideal which God held before them until they should 
be enabled to do it under the law of perfect love. 

In Isaiah 58 :7-ll marvelous blessings are promised 
if they should remember the poor and afflicted. It was 
the law of exchange, and not the "perfect law of lib- 
erty'' given by Christ. And yet few Christians expe- 
rience equal temporal blessings. They live with their 
names written under the Gospel, but knowing only the 
spirit of the law of exchange. And because they are 
not faithful to that law they receive less health and 
prosperity than was promised to the Israelites. They 
will receive the blessings t)f the law when they are 
faithful in its observance. They receive each one "a 
penny a day" when they bargain for it. The Lord 
keeps His part of the bargain, whatever it is. 

Let us, however, not misunderstand Him in his prom- 
ises, nor take advantage of them, if possible. The ex- 
change must pass through love to Him for He comes 
to us through love. And He does not always give the 
exact thing in exchange for what we give Him. We 
do not always know what is best for us, but He 
does. "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good 
gifts unto your children, how much more shall your 
Father which is in heaven give good things to them 
that ask Him." Matt. 7:1L 



THE INFINITE^ IN TRINITY AND UNITY 263 

But He does give abundantly, beyond measure, for 
what we give to Him, even under the old law of ex- 
change. Peace, hope, lightness, health, prosperity, all 
in our salvation. Perhaps not all of each of these we 
desire, but more returns than our giving to Him? Is 
it not so ? When we wonder why, then, that we are not 
healed immediately upon receiving the "poor that are 
cast out" to our house, as Isaiah says, let us consider 
if He has not given us more than we can measure in 
blessings besides health. And doubtless they are the 
ones we needed much more. He gave abundantly in ex- 
change, but chose the wisest gift for us. 

But there is a way for the person who would, to re- 
ceive every promise in the Bible very quickly. And 
they are great beyond conception, for they include the 
very God Himself, in all of His perfection. How shall 
we receive them ? Simply by giving all of self to Him. 
Not in exchange can we do this, but in union. We try 
to give all of self in exchange for Him when in reality 
we withhold some of His blessings for self. But we 
give all of self in union with Him when, with Him we 
give with His freedom and impartiality to every one. 

It is only in giving of self in union with Him that 
we come wholly under the ''perfect law of liberty." 
Until then we have a salvation which is under the law, 
but through faith in Christ. It is a large salvation ac- 
cording to our giving of self. 

In all of this let us not imagine God takes account 
of our response to Him, upon which He measures His 
gifts to us. It is not so. He has already given all of 
Himself to us. We are merely limited in receiving, by 
withholding self, or for self. "Ye ask, and receive not, 
because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon 
your lusts." Jas. 4:3. Prayer does not bring heaven 



264 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY ^ 

down to us for it is already at hand. It merely elimin- 
ates self to make room for God and heaven to come 
into us. 

In order to receive much of God, all of our giving 
must be done in love, even though it be human love, 
which looks for response in return. If given as a 
price to purchase blessings, all we can give will not go 
very far in the exchange. All the dollars the richest 
man upon earth can squeeze out of a lifetime of financ- 
ing can not equal the forces which are brought to bear 
to glean from the earth and air and sunshine a single 
ear of corn, which forms a part of one meal which we 
eat. It is the same with all other gifts or offerings we 
make. A whole life of our time, for instance, is less 
than the time which was consumed in order to bring 
the first rose which was made beautiful for man to look 
upon, into its perfect flower, or to perpetuate that 
flower after it was made possible, for our present view. 

Few Christians know a higher law than that of ex- 
change. Paul calls the law a schoolmaster to bring us 
to Christ. Many Christians are yet in the same old 
school. Although the old law was indeed "nailed to 
the Cross" most Christians still seek its shelter, albeit 
under the name of Christianity. While they think they 
are in the liberty of Christ they are under the rule of 
the schoolmaster. While there is joy under this rule 
there is fear also. The joy is that of the Jews and not 
of Christ. It is when we have entered the law of love 
in Christ Jesus that our joy is perfected and all fear is 
cast out. That is, in the spirit of His law. 

The law of loving and blessing, regardless of ex- 
change. The greatest happiness we have received be- 
fore is but a foretaste of the glory we enter in the per- 
fect law of liberty in Christ, who thought only of losing 



THE INFINITE^N TRINITY AND UNITY 265 

His life that others might be blessed. For they said 
of Him : "He saved others ; Himself He can not save." 
Was not His happiness perfected in so doing? Luke 
13:32. 

So shall we enter perfect happiness when we are able 
to pass from under the master's rule into the freedom 
of continually giving. It is indeed a daily school of 
self-renunciation that shall bring us into Christ's per- 
fection. Gentile and Jew must enter it alike. 

It was the spirit of the law which Christ rebuked in 
our social life when He said : ''When thou makest a din- 
ner or a supper call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, 
neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbors ; lest they 
also bid thee again, and a recompense be made thee. 
But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the 
maimed, the lame, the blind : and thou shalt be blessed ; 
because they have not wherewith to recompense thee: 
for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of 
the just." Luke 14:12-14. 

The wrong was not in the society of congenial friends 
nor in the hospitality offered, but in the sefishness of 
expecting an exchange of favors. There was not Heav- 
en's perfect happiness in it. Christ came to teach them 
Heaven's happiness. And were one to invite even 
those He described, who can not recompense him, and 
to hope instead for his recompense "in the resurrection 
of the just," as his reward, the error would be the 
same, apart from the virtue of his faith in God to give 
the reward. It would still be done in the spirit of the 
Law from Sinai. 

Under the law of Christ's life for others, when with 
Paul we can say, "I am crucified with Christ: never- 
theless I live ; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me : and the 
life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of 



266 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for 
me," (Gal. 2 :20), everything is different. 

There is no more tithing now, 'Tor ye are bought 
with a price: therefore glorify God in your body and 
your spirit, which are God's." 1 Cor. 6:20. No more 
giving, hoping for a blessing in exchange, for God al- 
ready *'Hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in 
heavenly places in Christ." Eph. 1 :3. No more pur- 
chasing health by kind deeds, for by Christ's ''stripes 
ye were healed." 1 Pet. 2 :24. No more giving in order 
that the Lord may give houses and lands in return, for 
Christ ''became poor, that ye through His poverty 
might be rich." 2 Cor. 8 :9. 

Everything which Christ has purchased is for us as 
a free gift, and not as a purchase upon our part. There 
is not a blessing any one has received but is ours also. 
We do not receive, because we live under the law of 
ordinances, or expecting favors in return for doing or 
loving. 

It is the way of the world, but it is not God's best 
way. "For the wisdom of this world is foolishness 
with God." We look to men. We expect to be blessed 
as other men are blessed. With gifts of healing or of 
miracles or of preaching or of tongues. We thereby 
glory in men. God rebukes us in rich and tender love 
when He says : 

"Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things 
are yours ; whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the 
world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to 
come; all are yours; and ye are Christ's; and Christ 
is God's." 1 Cor. 3 :21-23. "Eye hath not seen, nor ear 
heard, neither have entered into the heart of man^ the 
things which God hath prepared for them that love 
Him." 1 Cor. 2:9. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 267 

**For them that love Him!" That is the secret of 
receiving "all things." To love Him ''with all thine 
heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might." To 
love ''thy neighbor as thyself." Christ said that upon 
these two commandments hang all the law and the 
prophets. 

It means to love like He loved, as demonstrated in 
Christ. To love live a living fountain of waters, bless- 
ing and refreshing every one upon every hand. To 
love God and bless His name and other persons with no 
thought of health or prosperity or salvation coming 
from it. They come then without thinking. 

It was the love that shook the world with heavenly 
speech upon the day of Pentecost and which melted 
the world in kindness until they flocked by the thou- 
sands to receive God and join the throng in loving and 
giving to others with perfect joy. The same power, 
and greater, is ours, when we love as it is our privi- 
lege to do. 

Such love is the way of the final victory when Satan 
is cast down, when we are told that "they overcame him 
by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their tes- 
timony ; and they loved not their lives unto the death." 
Rev. 12:11. They overcame, not by the visible blood, 
but by the unseen life which that blood represents. 
"For the blood is the life." Deut. 12 :23. They over- 
came by faith in that Life which went out in love for 
others. Which cried out in love, even upon the cross, 
when not one received Him, "Father, forgive them ; for 
they know not what they do." And "the word of their 
testimony" was not merely the spoken word which peo- 
ple hear. But it was the Living Word of Christ's same 
life in them going out in the same spirit to bless and 
love all. 



268 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

With most Christians the Spirit of life which indeed 
dwells within them through Christ, is united with the 
Law from Sinai. Christ is united with self. And 
while God is so considerate of us, as His ignorant but 
well meaning children, as to permit us to walk to- 
gether in that way in the flesh, because we can not 
rise above it, we have not the freedom of heaven when 
we shall be free of self. Nor have we the victory of the 
perfected Christ within us nor manifest in our lives. 
In order to have that, the Unseen must envelop and con- 
trol the Seen in our lives. The law of perfect love must 
overwhelm and consume the desire of self, thus making 
peace. 

To do otherwise is to put ''a piece of new cloth unto 
an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it up 
taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse." 
Matt. 9 :16. That is what Christians usually try to do. 
They find something lacking in their lives of sin, and 
they receive Christ in order "to fill it up." Then al- 
ways **the rent is made worse." That is, they begin to 
suffer in the flesh as never before. Trials and tempta- 
tions come which they never had experienced. They 
are told to expect this, because the Bible says ''All that 
will live Godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecu- 
tion." 2 Tim. 3:12. 

They overlook the further Bible teachings that they 
shall rise to where they will not feel the persecutions, 
and that ''nothing (including persecutions) shall by 
any means hurt you." Luke 10 :19. Or that if they do 
feel them it will bring happiness instead. "Blessed are 
ye when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and 
shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my 
sake." Matt. 5 :11. For His sake means when we have 
the life of love in us which He perfected in Himself 
which lost itself for others. Luke 23 :34. 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 269 

Our hardships come from our living below or being 
satisfied with less than the ideal in Him. By our try- 
ing to add the Gospel to the Law, instead of permitting 
the former to fulfill the latter. Of trying to unite 
Christ with self instead of permitting Him to fulfill 
all the hopes self ever had. 

We try to *'put new wine into old bottles." We can 
not put the Gospel, or the law of perfect love expand- 
ing to all creatures everywhere, into the old bottle of 
the Law, or of self, whose greatest happiness is in a 
perfect exchange of blessings. Were we able to do it 
the Law and self would both be broken by the expan- 
sion of love beyond the confines of either, and the per- 
fection of our love would be lost. Then would "the 
wine be spilled." 

Instead, the **new wine" of perfect love may saturate 
and overflow self in an increasing tide of usefulness to 
others, until self is so completely drowned that God has 
His perfect way through us. It is by entering the 
new wholly and unreservedly, however, instead of unit- 
ing it with self retained. It must be entered wholly 
before we ever receive the freedom of Christ concern- 
ing which He said: "If the Son therefore shall make 
you free ye shall be free indeed." Jno. 8 :36. 

That it is almost the universal experience of Chris- 
tians to undergo real suffering and distress without 
entering into a life which feels no suffering in perfect 
love, appears to be an argument against what we are 
writing. However, "Let God be true, but every man a 
liar." And if but one prove a glorious exception to 
the rule who shall say his experience is not for all ? 

Of such an one we write. He goes in and out 
amongst the brethren, ministering all the day and 
much of the night to lost and straying ones in need of 



270 TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

soul and bodily comfort and healing. Prior to his 
twenty-eighth year of age, about seven years ago, he 
was a drunkard, blasphemer, liar, morphine fiend, 
without the knowledge of God or God's ways. For his 
father was a man of like character before him, and his 
associates had been of his kind. In misery and in 
hatred of his very existence he tried to take his own 
life, but failed. He gnashed his teeth in the tortures 
of hell in his soul. Without knowing God he neverthe- 
less reached out after Him, in hopes there was a God. 

But he wanted no God to "fill up'' the parts of self 
he was tired of. For he was tired of all parts and he 
wanted a God to make all things new. And God did 
this very thing. When the man went to sleep God 
gave him peace and when he waked up it was a new 
world. He could not swear, nor drink, nor worry, nor 
fear, nor doubt. He knew it was God who had come in 
and he ran to a Christian altar and wept without ceas- 
ing, for the change. He has been persecuted since, but 
has not felt it, except in joy. 

He was strangled and choked into what they thought 
was death, but he felt it not. He was stripped of his 
clothes and every tissue and muscle of his body, so far 
as possible, was bruised to a jelly, and he felt it less 
than a splinter in his hand had pained him in the old 
life. He lives to tell the story to those who know his 
daily ministry. It is too strange for others to believe. 
For his Lord did not even permit the marks of his per- 
secution to remain. It is no greater experience than 
any one may have as soon as self is out and God comes 
in. Nor as great, for there is still self in him. He is 
known amongst us merely as ''Brother Dennis." His 
life is one of love, love, love, in service to all. 

So we see there is a life of service to God, after we 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 271 

have accepted Christ, which is but partly free, and in 
which we are still under the spirit of the law. It is 
not displeasing to God when we can rise no higher. It 
is when we know the more perfect service and refuse it 
that we come under condemnation. 

Each one's individual experience in entering into 
Christ's freedom was typified by the experience of 
Israel when Christ, the "Light of the World" appeared 
to them in the flesh. When they rejected Him and cru- 
cified Him they came under condemnation such as they 
had never experienced. Until then their service under 
the Law was acceptable, though it was not perfect. But 
they had known no better. For ''the times of this ig- 
norance God winked at, but now (then) commandeth 
all men everywhere to repent." Act 17 :30. 

So it is that living in the spirit of the Law is accept- 
able unto God, even in Christ, when it is impossible 
for one to live in a baptism of Christ's holy love through 
the Holy Ghost, as promised. For Paul tells us that 
"the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, 
and good." Rom. 7:12. 

It is when the Holy Spirit shows one the freedom 
of Christ's perfect love, and it is rejected, that condem- 
nation comes. For this reason this chapter will bring 
many who have been free in Christ under the spirit of 
the Law, into condemnation, if they refuse to enter His 
love of free and joyful sacrifice for others. Each one 
must nail self to the Cross before he is dead to the 
spirit of the law. 

Christ Himself was not free from the human spirit 
which weighed upon Him, or the spirit of the law, lov- 
ing response in the Seen, until after He was perfected 
upon the cross. "I looked for some to take pity, but 
there was none ; and for comforters, but I found none." 



272 TR^ INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY '. 

Ps. 69 :20. But after His resurrection He was neither 
elated nor cast down by either response or rejection in 
the Seen. The only reproof He gave then was for their 
sakes, because they were "slow of heart to believe all 
that the prophets have spoken." Luke 24 :25. 

All who have a free conception of the glory of the 
perfect law of liberty above the Law from Sinai, as pic- 
tured faintly by Paul in Heb. 12:18-29, can not fail to 
be humbled before the glory in God's service which 
av/aits those who enter fully the spirit of the law of 
Christ, in complete separation from the spirit of the 
former law. For they will see how one's life in Christ 
is marred by a vestige of the spirit of the old law in us 
as greatly as Christ's perfect law would have been 
marred of its perfection by embracing the least im- 
perfection of the Law of Moses. 

As we sing praises unto our God that He did not 
permit the latter, shall our perfect hearts be satisfied 
by day or by night until we are living free of the spirit 
of the old law in a deliverance that only the baptism 
with the precious Holy Ghost, who infolds Christ's 
freedom, can give us and keep within us in His pow- 
erful presence? Is there a thing more vital to our 
freedom in Christ than this ''promise of the Father?" 

When we look within our own being do we not see 
in miniature all that the law of Moses and its fulfill- 
ment in Christ, through broad centuries of time and 
amidst great and stirring panoramas of events typi- 
fied ? And within ourselves do we not see in miniature 
all that shall come to pass in the world before the com- 
ing of Christ? We must pause and tremble and wor- 
ship before a God who has made of man so wonderful 
a being ! 

Thus, the moment we have given ourselves to God 



THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 273 

self begins to manifest the law of Moses. Self seeks 
to live justly before God and man. To weigh all mat- 
ters conscientiously and to make a perfect exchange in 
all dealings. Self's idea of this is ''duty." Right and 
fair dealing. Its most perfect rule is ''all things what- 
soever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even 
so to them: for this is the law and the prophets." 
Matt. 7:12. So just it is that it is called "the golden 
rule." But after all, it is the old law. 

Christ brought in a still better rule. It is a "dia- 
mond rule" which strikes a consuming fire of anything 
in this world against which it is perfectly arrayed. 
He comes into our lives with more than justice, for He 
is perfect love. Under the fire of the Holy Spirit's 
baptism our dealings are tempered with what is in- 
finitely more tender and sensitive and deep and full 
than our conscience, for we have the tenderness and 
richness of the Holy Spirit of God Himself. There is 
then more than equality in our dealings with our fellow- 
men, for it is God's own delight within us in pouring 
upon them all they can hold, regardless of what they 
have done for us. Is it not wonderful! Wonderful! 
Wonderful ! It is the perfect law of Christ's life above 
the old law of exchange in the spirit of self. 

For Christ comes into us, not to destroy self or our 
individuality, as an entity which exists, as previously 
noted, just as He came not to destroy the law. But 
as He came to fulfill the law, in all of its promises and 
hopes, so He comes into us to fulfill all the promises 
and hopes and ideals which we have ever had in the 
highest and greatest moments within our own selves. 
As the law made nothing perfect, even in its best appli- 
cation, neither can self, in its holiest hopes. But Christ 
did in His perfect law, and He shall within us if we 
permit it. 



274 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

And of the future, everything which is portrayed in 
the drama of the world^s onmoving life, of commotions, 
and of wars and rumors of wars, and nation against 
nation, of troublous times such as have never been, of 
moon being turned into blood and the sun to darkness, 
before the coming of Christ in His final glory, has its 
likeness in miniature in each individual life which shall 
receive Christ in His perfect likeness, in the flesh. 
Commotions and wars and conflicts in the flesh, and 
self's sun must be darkened and its brightest moons 
be turned into the blood of Christ, or His perfect life, 
before we can receive His fullness. 

Who is able for these things ? But be not dismayed. 
God is able. Not a thing of the flesh can stand in the 
way of the Holy Spirit when self is consumed in His 
mighty presence. "Fear not, little flock. For it is the 
Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell 
that ye have, and give alms; provide yourselves bags 
which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that 
faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth 
corrupteth. For where your treasure is, there will 
your heart be also." Luke 12 :32-34. 

When we see how great a proportion of Gentiles are 
still under the spirit of the law from Sinai is it any 
wonder God should bring this truth to light before 
the restoring of the Jews to His favor? How can we 
hope to win them to Christ, many of whom are no 
more under the spirit of the law than we, although 
they acknowledge its authority as we do not? And when 
both Gentile and Jew embrace freedom in Christ's per- 
fect love shall not the former need to renounce self 
as well as the latter? 

Verily when the twain of these two nations become 
one people in God, as predicted in Eph. 2:11-18, both 



THE INFINITE^IN TRINITY AND UNITY 275 

must yield self to the Christ whose wondrous salva- 
tion from self few have understood. Nor can there 
be the least shadow of prejudice between the two, when 
perfect love which does not regard self is in and 
through them. There can be no fear that one shall 
take advantage of the other or be favored more than 
is due when perfect love abounds. 

Neither Gentile nor Jew have known the meaning of 
God's renunciation of Himself in perfect love, referred 
to by Paul when he writes concerning Christ, 

"For He is our peace, who hath made both one, and 
hath broken down the middle wall of partition'' — which 
is self — "between us ; Having abolished in His flesh the 
enmity" — in self — "even the law of commandments 
contained in ordinances ;" — of exchange for self — "for 
to make in Himself of twain one new man, so making 
peace; and that He might reconcile both unto God in 
one body by the cross," — self-renunciation — "having 
slain the enmity thereby : and came and preached peace 
to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh. 
For through Him" — Self-renunciation — "we both have 
access by one Spirit" — of Self-renunciation, the Holy 
Spirit— "unto the Father." Eph. 2:14-18. 

Can anything possibly hinder our union as branches 
in the Vine when we each have this Spirit? And can 
either of us approach God or enter His heaven with 
any spirit short of it, or through a life of less than self- 
renunciation in love with Christ enthroned within? 

It is God's perfect love, which gives, gives, gives 
without the thought of self. Which is the same to high 
or low, rich or poor, the chosen or the cast outs. This 
is absolutely impossible in the human, and even God's 
love is so bound in human vessels that its overcoming 
growth is slow. Herein is a place for love for all the 



276 THE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 

nameless infants in the world to occupy in our hearts 
above the love of friends. When love for such is per- 
fected it is the perfection in embryo of love to all the 
world. For do not nameless infants descend from every 
rank in life, from seats upon thrones to dens of vice and 
crime? Is it not true in the broadest sense that "a 
little child shall lead them" into the greatest existence 
there is upon earth or in heaven? And then shall the 
church be able the world around to sing 

"In Love's White Heated Flow." 

(In Pisgah Home Songs. Tune — "Sweet By and By.") 

There's a life filled with gladness and love. 
'Tis a stream right from heaven above, 
And it reaches the rich or outcast, 
Passing oft by the first for the last. 

Chorus. 

In love's white heated flow 

There are none e'er too high or too low. 

To be bound with the Blood, 

In a bundle of life with our Lord. 

There is health right from heaven above, 
'Tis the promise of mercy and love. 
Through the stripes of the Christ who has borne 
All that's sick and infirm to the throne. 

'Tis a life we shall follow with heart 
Humble, meek, lowly and all contrite ; 
Heaven's blessings shall then on us fall 
As our love goes alike out to all. 



TEE INFINITE, IN TRINITY AND UNITY 277 



In conclusion we are aware that this book is h*ke a 
vista in a landscape opening that we may view a bound- 
less sea beyond, and a sea which is ours to sail upon 
freely. For truly through this 'Vista" a sea of truth 
and righteousness opens before us in a life right 
now which seems as boundless as the sea for all we 
know. Those who can scarce keep afloat amidst the 
little ripples of Life's current may not dare to venture 
upon the Sea. And yet inspiration should come even 
to those in the knowledge of the Sea being for them 
if they can bear it. 

It is God's overwhelming greatness of life for us 
to enter into right now which inspires us with worship 
which makes the heart grow large. This is the secret 
of a simplicity which is so triumphant in the religion 
of many who are illiterate and superstitious. A tri- 
umph accordingly great is for those of the highest 
culture and learning who are permitted to see God as 
He really wants to appear in their present lives. Every 
one shall have the simplicity of a child before Him 
when they see Him so now, instead of hoping for some- 
thing greater than men have known only in a distant 
future. And then the great future is ours too. 



JUN 14 1913 



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